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foxghost · 5 years

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鎮魂 Guardian [Zhen Hun] extra 3 full translation

No real spoilers in this one, just fluff and crack. [TN: the other extras are here, you may want to check out #4 for notes on names.] Original Chinese character count: 4363 English Translation + notes word count: 4042

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Later, the Special Investigation Department moves away from 4 Bright Road to 9 University Road, just one pedestrian crossing away from Dragon City University.

Lin Jing lingers at their old address just before the move, reluctant to leave and goes around and around the empty office with his recently upgraded equipment — a long barrel SLR camera — and photographs every last detail; not even the cobwebs escapes his scrutiny. When he’s done, Lin Jing picks out the few he’s satisfied with and sends them to a magazine publisher, hoping to make a name for himself in the “Former Haunts” series.

Thus leading to the editor-in-chief of the magazine suffering a great blow to his delicate psyche.

The editor-in-chief ends up in the hospital over the incident, and reporting what they perceived as a 'malignant, intentional manufacturing of supernatural photographs for the purpose of scaring people" to the police. As familial shame cannot be spread abroad, Zhao-chu can only show his face and quietly settle things behind the scenes. When he comes back, he beats the crap out of that idiot fake monk in the path of his innocent gaze.

Eat, sleep, beat Lin Jing; the crew at 9 University Road finally fall back into their ordinary, everyday routine.

The accommodation at their new office is decadent to the extreme, with a sunny attic upstairs and a double cellar below. The second cellar houses their book collection, while the first cellar is a shrine-like space with a mahjong table surrounded by a circle of memorial tablets. During the day it provides a resting place for their ghost employees, and any individual suffering from insomnia can get up and play a round of mahjong.

… And so, during the day, one can often hear the sound of shuffling mahjong tiles from the mysteriously locked first cellar.

On the top floor, the attic is warm and bright with sunshine, painted with a thick layer of soundproofing paint; those who are tired can take a noon nap, and opening the windows affords one the view of the whole courtyard — unfortunately there is no beautiful scenery to be had.

Since members of the S.I.D. could not come to an agreement regarding a plan for the garden, there’s no unified theme. After they divided up the space, the courtyard has become a weird mixture of styles containing a little bit of everything.

Zhao Yunlan claims the entire rear courtyard for himself. With an oddly cultivated aesthetic that has nothing at all to do with the arts that he’s ignored his whole life through, he vetoes Zhu Hong’s favoured Japanese roses, vetoes Chu Shuzhi’s suggestion of vines, vetoes Lin Jing’s request of a Bodhi tree … ultimately planting an entire rear courtyard worth of vegetables.

There’s mini cole, cherry tomatoes, pumpkin seedlings, pea sprouts, Chinese cedar sprouts … a veritable neighbourhood of assorted vegetables growing side by side. In the middle of it all stands a coquettish eggplant surrounded by all the other plants the way stars surround the moon.

[TN: 風騷茄子 / Coquettish Eggplant is a dish…this ia a pun.]

Zhao Yunlan hints that come winter he’ll even fill the entire rear courtyard with bok choi.

From then onwards, neither mortal nor ghost has played in the rear courtyard that has become a vegetable garden.

By the time Shen Wei finishes class, the sun has already begun inclining towards the west. It’s still warm outside, and the short stroll from school even counting the time it takes to wait for the light to change is only five, six minute at most.

The entire staff of the S.I.D. each holds a copy of Teacher Shen’s class schedule. They wait eagerly for his arrival daily as one watches for the stars and the moon. There was once a time that the soldiers skipping out on work along with the leader was routine, because when the ceiling beams are crooked the pillars came along; since their leader Zhao Yunlan stopped messing around and started calmly spending all his days in the office like a hermit though, those days are long gone.

In this respect, everyone feels a little depressed, even in light of their new surroundings.

Yet when Teacher Shen arrives he can always swiftly take the leader away. And if the leader is gone, naturally it implies that everyone else can leave work early as well.

As he steps through the door, Shen Wei is greeted by countless “good day Teacher Shen” and “good work Teacher Shen” and many more besides along with such fervent looks from everyone that it’s borderline like the staff are held in enemy territory awaiting a liberating army. Shen Wei finds it hard to adapt to this at first, but as time goes by he’s no longer fazed by all the attention.

Guo Changcheng is zoning out, Zhu Hong is doing some online stopping, Chu Shuzhi is watching the candlestick graph, Lin Jing is tinkering with a new model of wiretapping device: a fish scale-like thing the size of a girl’s fingernail that turns invisible and records in secret once it sticks to anything.

Black cat Daqing nests on the staircase handrail, waving his tail at Shen Wei. “He’s in the attic.”

Shen Wei makes an approving hum, nods as he says “Thank you,” but when he’s just about to pass by, he lifts a brow slightly and glances at Daqing. “Be careful, don’t fall off now.”

… The handrail only looks half as big as Daqing’s stomach. The way he’s lying prone on top of it looks extremely weird.

Daqing stares blankly for a full second, then with a wail he turns into an angry furball. “I’m practicing—Yo—ga! What’s wrong with practicing yoga? You got a problem with that?”

Keeping a smile on his face, Shen Wei reaches out to stroke his head, and goes upstairs.

Daqing furiously drapes himself back down on the handrail. Lin Jing asks, teasing, “Aiyoh, little princeling Daqing, which yoga pose are you practicing?”

Daqing says after a pause, “Cat pose.”

Those who follow the Way never lies, so goes the doctrine. Lin Jing appropriately shows his evaluation with a peal of laughter.

… As a result he gained two new bloody scratches on his face. The wiretap in his hand goes flying towards destination unknown, turning invisible.

Lao-Li, who’s always appearing without a sound and vanishing without a trace, appears now to quietly supply cotton swabs and bandages as if he’s the hapless master responsible for the aftermath of his cat’s crimes. Yet the cat has no appreciation for his love at all, and doesn’t bother with even a snort as he jumps off the railing into a cat stretch and leaving the scene.

There are times when such a thing as love is like a fragile pane of glass. It doesn’t matter what kind of love it is: nothing can glue it back together after it shatters, even if the ones involved no longer cared, even if they have already chosen to forgive.

That’s why a person should be faithful to oneself unto death. Whether choosing to be so selfish as to hurt countless without regrets, or to cherish another’s affection from the beginning, even at the risk of looking like a fool.

Shen Wei pushes open the door to the top floor lightly. There’s a sofa bed in the attic situated for a full day of sunlight, and Zhao Yunlan naps there with a blanket thrown across his waist, fingers still trapped between the pages of a book in his hands.

Shen Wei approaches quietly, stooping to kiss him lightly on the lips. Zhao Yunlan doesn’t bother opening his eyes, he hums lazily with sleep and says, “You’re done with class?”

Shen Wei answers with an agreeing noise, reaching out to prop up Zhao Yunlan by his back so he can sit down. “Wake up a little. It’s not early anymore, and if you fall asleep again you won’t be able to sleep later.”

Zhao Yunlan takes advantage of the shift in position to lie down on Shen Wei’s thighs. Yawning, he says blearily, “I didn’t actually want to sleep.”

With half-lidded eyes he waves the “Vegetable Planting Techniques” in his hands and grumbles, “I’m telling you, this book has to be cursed. I can’t ever get to the first chapter. Just the forward is enough to knock someone out. I only made it to the 8th page now and I’m still stuck in the introduction.”

Shen Wei picks it up and flips through its pages. It’s a textbook from the agricultural university, and not a single centimetre of white space is wasted — even the pictures are black and white and so serious it has no entertainment value whatsoever. Shen Wei puts it aside and says without thinking, “Why do you bother reading it? If luck’s on their side, whichever seed you sow may even chance into a refined essence and become Yao. There is no chance that any of them wouldn’t grow.”

Zhao Yunlan says, “No, only science and technology is the primary productive force.”

[TN. he’s quoting fundamental principle of Marxism here so that’s why SW makes fun of him.]

Shen Wei says after a pause, “Why don’t you go back to study science and technology then.”

Zhao Yunlan rolls his eyes, and harbouring ulterior motives, says, “The primary productive force and I are jinxed. It reduces me to sleep in a single glance.”

[TN. 犯克 roughly means “it disagrees with my birth hour.” So it does mean jinxed, but with him ONLY.]

Shen Wei looks down, discovering that whatever sleepiness in Zhao Yunlan’s pitch black eyes have already evaporated, and they stare up at him with wordless amusement.

Zhao Yunlan reaches around so he’s holding Shen Wei by the waist. “If I can’t keep reading, then I’ll forget my meals, my mood will plunge, and if it goes on any longer I’ll fall into a depression!”

Shen Wei just looks at him without saying a word.

One lie after another comes out of Zhao Yunlan’s mouth. “Listen, the suicide rate is really high in Northern Europe because the cold climate leads to depression. Kunlun mountain is covered in ice and snow that never melts — it doesn’t even have heat, so my bones must carry the genes for depression.”

Shen Wei is silent for a time before saying, “You must forgive my inability to see this.”

Zhao Yunlan says, “You must not love me anymore! You … man of easy virtue!”

[TN. ZYL says SW has a “nature as ever changing as running water and alights on all like flower petals,” and it’s usually a phrase meaning ‘fickle woman.’]

Shen Wei pushes at his temple as if to hold back a headache. “Stop acting so spoiled. What would you like?”

Zhao Yunlan laughs a mischievous laugh, revealing a row of neat white teeth.

“Fine. I’ll read it to you when we get home,” Shen Wei says, helplessly gentle, before uncomfortably averting his gaze. “But if you’re going to listen, then be good and listen. If you get drowsy listening then sleep. You’re not allowed to mess around.”

His ears are taking on a flush, and he looks like a half-willing young bride that’s just been picked on by an evil tyrant taking liberties, only half-willing because he’s left without a choice.

Zhao Yunlan grabs hold of Shen Wei’s collar indignantly and pulls him closer. “Can I trouble you not to be such a pure white lotus okay baby? From the fucking moment we met 'til now have I ever successfully taken a single dime of advantage of you … fine I’ll admit I’ve had more criminal attempts, but I haven’t any criminal reality!”

Shen Wei hastens to placate him. “Okay okay okay, get up. Let’s go home.”

“I can’t.” Zhao Yunlan turns his face to the side, expressionless. “The muscles in my lower back are strained.”

Shen Wei says softly, bashful, “Then should I carry you?”

Zhao Yunlan takes a look at him in silence, and stands up in silence. He finds that his back doesn’t hurt at all anymore — but he does feel a pang in his stomach.

As soon as they step through the front door, the rest of the staff scatter like birds and beasts. Zhu Hong’s the first to slip out, with Lin Jing closely following. Chu Shuzhi pours himself a cup of cheap tea, holding fast until the stock market closes before leisurely putting things away. As he’s about to go he raises his head to discover that Guo Changcheng still hasn’t left yet.

[TN. 茶水 / cha shui / lit. tea water / cheap tea is the kind of tea you get in diners, usually ceylon, comes in a plastic cup, made with cheaper leaves and brewed bulk in a metal dispenser.]

The room is empty save for them. Guo Changcheng sitting there staring into space without a word looks like a painted stage set, dazed to distraction. Chu Shuzhi asks casually, “Why haven’t you left yet?”

As if shaken from a dream, Guo Changcheng trembles violently and bumps the water-dwelling plant, spilling it all over his desk.

Chu Shuzhi subconsciously reaches for his own face; suspecting that maybe he’s been slack in the cultivation of his arts and his livor-mortis is showing, somehow managing to scare this unfortunate child until he’s beside himself.

Guo Changcheng stammers, “I um I’m leaving,” and cleans up in a flurry of activity.

Chu Shuzhi can read body language well enough, so he asks, “Are you planning to go bomb a bunker? Why do you look like you’re going to war?”

If Guo Changcheng has a pair of dog ears, he guesses now they would be drooping.

Twenty minutes later, the two emerge from 9 University Road with Chu Shuzhi furrowing his brow and coming to a conclusion. “That is to say, your second uncle wants you to go to a xiangqin.”

[TN. 相親 / Xiangqin. A marriage interview arranged by a matchmaker. A direct equivalent is the Japanese o-miai. The characters mean mutual-intimacy.]

A spray of sparks explodes out of Guo Changcheng’s pocket.

Chu Shuzhi quickly sidesteps. “Watch it. What’s with the groundless worry? Is this girl you’re meeting a tigress?”

To avoid setting his pants on fire, Guo Changcheng hurriedly takes the stun baton out of his pocket, but that only attracts the attention of passersby instead; they don’t even manage to make it to the parking lot before the traffic cop at the crosswalk yells at them, “What’s going on? You can’t set off fireworks within city limits! Where’s your sense of civic responsibility?”

Chu Shuzhi silently covers his face and pretends to look up at the sky.

The lich king is reclusive and detached; aside from the occasional garrulous words he exchanges with acquaintances, his entire person gives off an aura of do not approach， so he’s often lonely in the cold emptiness of his life. Outside of cultivating his essence, he has little to do in the long hours outside of work, leaving his well-hidden desire to gossip eternally unsatisfied. He feels a sudden curiosity of how this human custom of xiangqin is conducted, and with a tone like he’s volunteering to join a war, he says, “Ok, stop spraying fireworks. You’ll get a fine. Why don’t we do this — I’ll sit by you pretending to be just another customer the whole time for your xiangqin, alright?”

[TN. 屍王 / lit. corpse king. I suppose it could also read “necromancer” but he’s a corpse himself, so closer to a lich.]

Guo Changcheng gives him a tortured look, and from Chu Shuzhi’s solemn face he can just glean a hint of the curiosity of a gossiping fishwife.

They arrive more than thirty minutes earlier than the appointed time, and it’s only after Chu Shuzhi flip through an entire old magazine to pass the time before the girl arrives.

Chu Shuzhi looks on as Guo Changcheng freezes solidly into a human stick, and thinks with some amazement that he hasn’t seen a mortal with such great potential to become a jianshi for many years.

[TN. 人棍 / human stick is actually a brutal ancient torture that’s best not described here. CSZ uses some harsh language in his head…

殭屍 / Jiangshi / what Chu Shuzhi is, is a culturally unique mythological creature that originated from the way undertakers were said to have ordered corpses to jump as they led the dead back to their hometowns for burial. Depending on the telling, they eat flesh, drink blood, sleep in coffins, fear the sun, and only in some stories do they have minds of their own.]

Chu Shuzhi moves his gaze downwards, finding Guo Changcheng’s pant cuffs shaking uncontrollably, his entire body resembling a quail that found itself falling heavily on its ass on broken glass. He congratulates himself for confiscating Guo Changcheng’s little stun baton beforehand, otherwise he’s sure the young lady’s perfectly ironed straight fringe would have been fried immediately into natural curls.

“Oh, come on. Grow up,” Chu Zhushi thinks, feeling rather disappointed on his behalf.

Fortunately, the young lady has a good temperament, and doesn’t go on Weibo on the spot to start a post titled, “Ran into someone outrageous at the xiangqin” as a souvenir. Instead she confidently attempts to keep the conversation going by cycling through a list of seemingly endless topics. From the start Guo Changcheng acts exactly like a criminal at a trial, whatever question thrown his way he must tremble thrice, all the while sending a continuous distress signal in Chu Shuzhi’s direction. Unfortunately Chu Shuzhi feigns interest in the menu and is utterly unreceptive.

Ten minutes of trembling later, the lady finally can’t help asking, “You … are you a little nervous?”

Guo Changcheng, red all over, nods at her.

The lady smiles a little. “It’s not important. We’re only having a casual chat.”

Guo Changcheng, still red all over, nods again, and carefully gives her a single glance before looking extremely ill at ease, turning his gaze away.

Normally when coming across someone that can’t even speak clearly, the other side would flip desk and leave, but this young lady who’s come to this xiangqin seem to have an odd weakness. Facing someone like Guo Changcheng, a sense of protectiveness inexplicably grows in her heart.

“I think you’re just like Raj from the Big Bang Theory,” she says happily. “Especially cute — my aunt says you’re a police officer. Really?”

Guo Changcheng makes a sound of agreement that comes off like a mosquito’s hum.

The lady says, “Really! I can’t tell at all. Then what do you do normally when you meet a bad person?”

Guo Changcheng spends a moment recalling, then truthfully illustrates just how he catches ‘bad people.’ He makes a clawing gesture, pretending to pick up his ‘secret weapon’ and says, “Just like this, and I tell, tell it, ‘you you you you you can’t come over here,’ and then I catch them.”

The lady stares at him blankly a second, and realising that it’s possibly a joke, she laughs, swaying back in forth in her mirth. “You’re just too cute!”

With naive eyes Guo Changcheng stares at her, utterly clueless.

Chu Shuzhi watches with his cheek in his hand and all the coolness of a bystander. When he thinks back on what they actually get up to during work, he does manage to find a hint of what one may call ‘adorkable.’ As he takes another look at the still happy girl and the utterly out-of-form Guo Changcheng, he glances at his watch. It’s starting to feel rather dull sitting here.

But once these two start chatting they seem to go on and on; Chu Shuzhi reins in his impatience, takes out his phone and plays games for ages until his vision’s starting to blur and he can’t take anymore. He waves at the waiter, “Ready to order.”

The waiter diligently comes over only to hear Chu Shuzhi say in a quiet and eerie voice, “One order of Kung Pao chicken, make sure the meat is only three parts done and still bloody.”

The waiter is silent.

Guo Changcheng overhears this from across the room and immediate turn around to glance at Chu Shuzhi, recognizes the gloomy corpse-like scowl on the lich (corpse) king and finally realises that he’s gotten carried away.

But while he racks his brains trying to wrap up the conversation, the other side suddenly goes from easy to stern and says to him, “Oh, right, actually I still want to say that …”

She pauses then, as if what she wants to say may be too embarrassing to mention.

Guo Changcheng asks, “What is it?”

The lady stares down at her lap and seems to think for a moment before saying, “This is our first meeting, so it’s probably not appropriate for me to be saying this, but I really do like you quite a bit …”

Guo changcheng sits as straight and stiff as a red Songhum tree — even his eyes seem to turn vertical.

She continues to say, “So there is something I want to say before anything else. I didn’t really want to come here today at first because my aunt said you were a criminal police officer. I don’t think living with a cop is especially stable, really. Everyday I’d have to be on edge all the time thinking about how you are, and as time goes on,” she trails off then, sighing. “Is this line of work something you must do?”

Guo Changcheng stares blankly for a second, and before he’s able to answer, a hand grabs onto his shoulder without any warning, hauling him right up from his seat.

Guo Changcheng says, “Chu-ge?”

It’s too sudden for the lady at her xiangqing to react, and her gaze at Chu Shuzhi shows no reaction.

Chu Shuzhi gives her a smile that doesn’t reach his eyes, before his attention shifts down towards Guo Changcheng, and he says with a tone that’s meant to cause confusion, “A Xiangqing behind my back? Why, you certainly have such gall!”

Guo Changcheng is shocked to silence.

What, what is this situation?

The lady’s eyes widen, captivated, completely in awe of the lich king’s aura and this utterly contrived plot. Chu Shuzhi reaches into Guo Changcheng’s pocket, digs out a few Renminbi bills and leaves them beneath a cup. Without another word of explanation, he stuffs Guo Changcheng beneath one arm and carries him out.

[TN. Renminbi, lit. The People’s money, the cash of the PRC.]

Guo Changcheng BSOD on scene and remains unresponsive until Chu Shuzhi stuffs him into the car. Chu Shuzhi stretches out his legs, and like an arrogant master of old, commands, “Start the car. Drop me off first.”

Guo Changcheng telegraphs ten thousand emotions tied up in knots in a single glance.

Chu Shuzhi says, “What are you glaring for, I’m doing this for her sake. To think she would dream up an idea like that, go digging at Kunlun-jun’s foundations. Really…”

[TN. 挖牆腳 - lit. dig at the foot of a wall. Applicable both in the case of someone seducing your husband or a competitor trying to lure away an employee.]

His speech halts, and a phrase comes to him unbidden like good fortune. He blurts out, "Stupid humans.

…Stupid human Guo Changcheng doesn’t say anything, and with his face still bright red, he silently starts the car.

On his satchel, a little round disc that resembles a scale invisibly transmits.

The next day, a rumour seem to spring up from everywhere at once: Chu-ge and Xiao-Guo’s gone steady, 9 University Rd is a nest for gays.

[TN. 搞大象 lit. setup-big-elephant. It came from 搞對象 lit. setup a partner. It’s just slang to replace the middle character with 大 / big, or 小 / small to indicate whether the partner is serious or casual.]

And what’s become of the person unfortunate enough to hear something he should not have, the Lin Jing who spread the rumours?

Oh, may the lord Buddha preserve us, he’s gained so many bumps on his head it’s wrapped in enough bandages to resemble a turban.

===

Much thanks to @lifeishwaiting for the final once over.

I’ve been sitting on this draft forever trying to get around the couple of derogatory terms the author used, and I did change them above, so I’ll note them here:

Raj from BBT was referred to as “The little Indian from BBT”

The last line used 印度阿三 and here’s the Baidu entry. I ended up using “turban” instead because it’s what she really meant as a description, and it’s a word used in Chinese history — think “Yellow Turban Rebellion” before the Three Kingdoms period.

#guardian #鎮魂 #weilan #guochu #guardian translations #fox translates 鎮魂 #fox translates zhen hun #zhen hun extra 3

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foxghost · 6 years

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沈巍 / Shen Wei - What’s in a name?

So I tagged in that other post #I could go on and on about Shen Wei’s name, and so why not.

This is the exchange between Kunlun and Shen Wei, the first time they meet. (chapter 77, so mildly spoilerish. The more spoilery part, I hid under a cut.)

“You can’t speak? Impossible.” Kunlun Jun drapes shapelessly onto the large boulder, lifting a brow. “Got a name? What are you called?” “… Wei.” “Which Wei?” “…Mountain ghost.” “Mountain ghost?” Kunlun Jun stretches out over the boulder, lifting a brow, “Appropriate, but a bit weak. Look at this world: mountains and oceans joining one to the next, towering peaks linking in an unending chain. Why not add a few more strokes, make a Wei.”

[TN. 嵬, what the ghost king introduced himself as, means “rocky terrain.” 嵬 is written with the radical ‘mountain’ on top of ‘ghost’. 巍 means ‘towering’ and keeps both of the radicals of 嵬]

Now let’s move on to 沈 / Shen, for a moment.

沈 / shen is the older form of 沉 / chen (meaning sunken). You can still spot it used instead of 沉 in older texts, in Taiwan, some parts of southern China. It’s a very, very old word, and it looked in ancient script (zhou era) like an animal halfway in the water. It was a sacrificial word, and the antonym of ‘float.’ There’s no mention of how he came by this last name in the novel, so we can assume he chose it for himself.

Kunlun has turned Wei’s name from the height of a boulder to a mountain. It gave Shen Wei that much farther to sink. And of course, as Zhanhun-shi that’s where he always goes when he’s not above in the human world or working. He goes ‘home’ to beneath 忘川, literally underneath a river ZYL claimed took HOURS to swim to the bottom of.

Now, take a look at this:

萬山之祖，巍巍崑崙 The ancestor of ten thousand mountains, towering Kunlun

Simplified Chinese REALLY DESTROYS IT. That’s actually carved on a (2) memorial stone(s) in northwestern China. It’s also known as the “source of the dragon artery.”

Let’s discard simplified Chinese for a moment (sorry) and consider the traditional writing of the same text: 巍巍崑崙 / pinyin: Wéiwéi kūnlún They are all topped with a mountain radical. In chapter 75, Shen Wei says this to Zhao Yunlan:

崑崙君身上壓著十萬大山，那麼痛苦，我捨不得你過那樣的日子。 Kunlun Jun is pressed beneath a hundred thousand mountains, I could not bear to watch you live in such pain.

…this is a lie. But it doesn’t make it any less true that keeping the name signifies his taking on all of Kunlun’s responsibilities. I’ll not elaborate on why Kunlun named Shen Wei 巍, but it’s definitely a name that links the ghost king to him. Shen Wei’s chose the last name Shen for himself: he made himself a sacrifice to a god.

/or you know, p大 chose it because it sounds nice. It does sound nice.

#guardian #shen wei #fox translates zhen hun #fox translates 鎮魂 #沈巍 #it may just be a little too easy to read too much into things in Chinese #so i'm going to go english for a bit #i mean write

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foxghost · 6 years

Video

youtube

[EN Sub]【镇魂 Guardian】【沈巍x赵云澜】Two hearts 两颗心（原著剧情补全版）

[Shen Wei x Zhao Yunlan] Two hearts (Original novel and drama complete merge)

Ok so there are many, many fanvids of the novel!verse / 原著向, and I’m practically collecting them by this point, but this one does the best job at joining the drama and novel together and it does so beautifully.

#fox translates zhen hun #fox translates 鎮魂 #videos #weilan #guardian #I'm honoured to be the person putting english on this #THIS IS HOW THE DRAMA ENDS #*IT IS LAW*#guardian fanvid

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foxghost · 6 years

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鎮魂 Guardian [Zhen Hun] extra 4 full translation

Or, the chapter that turns the ending of the Guardian drama into a happy ending. Translated for @lady-eden, to whom i recced 40eps of fluff and pain.

Original Chinese character count: 10201 translated word count: 9184 original text: https://www.bilibili.com/read/cv838549/

(1)

“… and then click on this. Now all you have to do is make up a payment PIN.” Zhao Yunlan hands the cellphone to Shen Wei, but after a moment of thinking he doesn’t wait for Shen Wei to take it and does it for him. “Forget it. I did it for you — it’s not like you have a new one anyway.”

Teacher Shen is stubbornly kind, has no concept of security, and all his PIN codes are just their street number.

Zhao Yunlan says, “Good thing you don’t have much money.”

Theoretically, comrade Shen Wei knows how to live just fine, and if he’s equally competent in handling his personal affairs — food, clothes, a place to live — as he is in administering the three realms, then he must be doing so adequately with plenty of energy to spare.

[TN. Three realms: desires, form, and formlessness]

Realistically, Shen Wei doesn’t know how to take care of himself at all — in chaotic times he would find some place out of the way and seclude himself, and when the world’s at peace he would make do with a rented room. He has wandered among mortals for many years, clean and free without making or worrying about money. Never mind buying property and settling down; until now, aside from a university-issued salary card he doesn’t own anything.

As for what’s between the earth and sky, the world’s mountains and valleys, the country’s administering its own tourism department and it’s not like they put aside a percentage for him.

“Come, let me teach you how to send a red pocket.” Zhao Yunlan hooks an arm over Shen Wei’s shoulder, ruining his dignified pose, and using teaching as an excuse takes his phone and gives himself a red pocket, accepting it happily. “This century’s very last old antique has formally entered the age of mobile payments, an occasion to be celebrated … tch, what now.”

His phone’s ringing before he’s done talking. Zhao Yunlan gives it a mere glance before deciding he doesn’t want to pick it up, turning it over. Unexpectedly, the other side doesn’t give up and calls three times in a row, and as if they know he’s playing deaf, makes the next call on his office phone. Zhao Yunlan stretches a leg over the small sofa and pushes Daqing with a foot, midway through the cat’s focused personal grooming. “Hey, fatso, pick up the phone.”

Because Shen Wei is here, Daqing bristles but doesn’t say anything, angrily whipping his tail as he jumps onto the desk. He pretends the phone receiver is Zhao Yunlan’s face and smacks it with a paw. “Wai? Special … Oh?” Daqing laughs, “Your leadership’s looking for our Chief Zhao? Oh, he says he’s not here.”

Zhao Yunlan remains silent.

He turns his phone over and discovers that the last three calls weren’t made by the same person — the last two were from his dad, so he’s forced to crawl towards his desk with a new headache. “These ghost and goblins. Don’t they have anything better to do? They’re all bothering the old man by the back door.”

The Special Investigative Division, or the “Zhenhun Ling,” used to be also a “Daycare” and “Labour Reformation centre for convicted criminals.”

[TN. Zhen-hun can translate to Calm-Soul, or Guard-soul, but it’s more than that. The word 鎮/zhen is like holding down a sheet of paper beneath a weight, and I don’t want to water it down, so for the rest of this I’m just going to use Zhenhun, as is. When it’s referred to as the Zhenhun-Ling, it’s also a wooden plaque, and sometimes a paper and cinnabar copy. The 'Ling" part is ambiguous — it’s the ‘command’ or ‘authority.’ Zhao Yunlan’s title is Zhenhun Lingzhu, or “Master of the Zhenhun Token,” but often only ‘Lingzhu’ is used, which can be translated to ‘Lord.’]

Outside of the mortal Xiao Guo, or Wang Zheng and Sangzan, comrades who’s been taken in by Zhenhun Lingzhu, the members of their staff can be roughly sorted into two categories: ones like Zhu Hong and Lin Jing, sent by their leaders or family to train and to gain experience in The Way, or the other kind like Chu Shuzhi, a convicted felon working off his time. To begin with, because the Zhenhun Ling was established to coordinate the three realms and to keep peace in the mortal realm, it’s really a thankless job: the everyday chore of wiping the asses of so-called evil perpetrators notwithstanding, they need to adhere to all the minutiae of society’s laws. There’s no real enlightenment to be had following their mortal of a boss around, so not many experts are willing to join them.

But now, things are different since the Great Seal shattered in a big way, the four holy artefacts returning to their places, the Great Wheel established, the Ghost King gaining godhood, Kunlun reclaiming his altar. Even though these facts are not well known, to those who are connected in the three realms, they are not really secrets, either. So the thankless, bitterly low paying work at the S.I.D. has become sweet dim sum overnight and everyone wants to join in order to rub shoulders with gods. Zhao Yunlan just hates to be bothered, and he refuses them all with the excuse of, “Can’t fit so many names on the Zhenhun Ling.”

However, even though the Zhenhun Ling can’t bear so many names, the Special Investigative Division can — The S.I.D. is an administrative agency.

And so in order to gain some connection to the Zhen Hun token, some smart people has gone around making noise, forcing the original S.I.D. into restructuring. Dragon City’s S.I.D. has morphed into “Special Investigative Bureau” and every region gets their own agency; it’s become quite an organisation.

In this way, Department Head Zhao — Zhao Chu — who spends most of his time lying about in the attic of 9 University Road has somehow lain his way into becoming Bureau Chief Zhao — Zhao Ju.

This is the first year the S.I.B. started officially recruiting after their restructuring. The Zhao Yunlan who’s quite happy passing the years quietly planting vegetables in the S.I.B. yard has been dragged out of his attic to manage the recruitment. Even though none of these newbies are to be entered into the Zhenhun Ling, they’re still to join a ‘branch office,’ and Zhao Yunlan doesn’t want to invite a bunch of shoddy staff members on the quality of unformed melons just to make up the numbers — it’s not like he’s short on idiots — and now that the bureau’s manpower’s limited, it’s impractical to have a big recruitment fair. This is why they’ve only sent out a small number of registration forms to each tribe and sect, to let their leaders choose their own candidates.

In order to get a few more registration forms, the experts from everywhere are pulling out all the stops — making like the eight gods crossing the seas, working miracles.

“Wai?” Zhao Yunlan lazily picks up the phone, sighs, “Isn’t an old man like you retired by now? Why are you wasting your time on this instead of organising with some old ladies and going square dancing? Nobody asked you to go around networking — Ugh…”

Daqing perks up his ears, taking in the robust long form essay from the other side in all rounded news-syllables. Zhao Yunlan tries to interrupt, coming up with excuses, “I’m not, I didn’t,” without avail, and finally he gives up and leans on the edge of the table, nothing to do but to go from studying the ceiling to staring at Teacher Shen’s god-level dust-free clean cuffs, finding himself seriously missing Shennong Bo — at least mister broken bowl didn’t have all this desire to monologue.

[TN: Shennong’s ascended medicine pot / 農藥缽 was the one possessing Yunlan’s father in the book.]

Lately, the retired old director’s been the object of too many heartfelt visits by strangers, and once he figures out what’s happening, explodes in a fit of anger. It’s already 2018 and he’s never imagined that there are still people who would go to such lengths — to knock at such an out of the way backdoor — to get some rotten registration forms. How is this organisation run?

So he decides to call his son to give him a thorough lecture.

Zhao Yunlan answers as if reading a Buddhist prayer, “Yes, I know … you said it … no, I’m not using this opportunity to take bribes. The resources really are limited, we have too many applicants, we really can’t meet them all … I have not corroded away, it’s not as if we’re getting acid rain in Dragon City … no, I don’t need to have a smart mouth everyday. I’m facing the wall in serious reflection of my wrongs everyday, really, nipping all the bad in the bud … if you don’t believe me, ask Shen Wei!”

There are three knocks on the office door, and Lin Jing sticks his head in holding a calendar, but not before facing Shen Wei and greeting him with a fist in hand. “Thank you Teacher Shen — leader, tomorrow’s Duanwu, the Dragon Boat Festival. I’m asking on behalf of everyone in the department: are you sending out holiday gifts?”

Zhao Yunlan, craning his neck to keep a phone receiver held between his chin and his shoulder, happens to have no energy for this, points at the door. “I’m sending a notice on how to pass the holiday with integrity. Get out!”

Representative Lin takes the blow and runs away in disgrace.

But Zhu Hong is already knocking just as he leaves. “Thank you Teacher Shen — Zhao Ju, my Sishu asked me to arrange a dinner. A few leaders from the yao tribes want to pay their respects,” she sighs, “I’m only passing on the request. They’re pretty annoying so if you don’t feel like going, don’t go. You don’t have to worry about giving me face.”

[TN. Sishu just means fourth uncle. 蛇/snake is pronounced Shé and after this I’m just going to use that as a last name.]

[TN. 妖 / Yao is generally translated to demon / monster, but in Chinese myth they’re mostly ‘ascended’ souls, not evil by nature. They’re not exactly ‘beasts’ either — you can have an ascended rock or a tree, and in the case of the being that possessed Yunlan’s father, a god’s medicine pot. They’re all ‘yao.’]

Zhu Hong is one of their own, and truly he doesn’t need to worry about such superficial bullshit as giving face when it comes to her, but the yao tribes are Kunlun Jun’s spiritual descendents, and in the ‘face’ of the yao tribe elders he’s left with no choice but to respect them. Zhao Yunlan can only wave at Zhu Hong helplessly.

[TN. Jun is an honorific tacked onto any man from a monarch to a scholar.]

The moment Zhu Hong turns around, she nearly run right into Chu Shuzhi, who’s is in such a hurry he only had time to nod at her. “Wait — Lao Zhao, something’s happened. Someone’s … pulled a trick on the application forms.”

Shen Wei, who has been firmly focused on playing with his phone hears this and raises his head. “What is it?”

In the everyday work of the S.I.B, Shen Wei tend not to participate in conversations unless someone asks him a question; this time, when he cuts in on his own, it is because the “watermark” on the application form is something he helped create. The Zhanhun Shi guarded the Great Seal and did not misspent these five thousand years; every leader of every tribe, from their celebrated beginnings to their bitter ends lived beneath his watchful eye. His entire person is a living “Lost Magics library” … but since no one dares to come buy the rights from him, this “library” remains poor.

[TN. Zhanhun Shi / 斬魂使 literally: cut-soul-person. I could call him “Soul Slayer” but a name is a name. Shi is an honorific, of sorts. In this case an occupational one.]

Chu Shuzhi says, “The application deadline’s still ten days away, but the applications we’ve received has already exceeded the numbers we sent out — oh, right, thank you Teacher Shen.”

Shen Wei creases his brows.

“Gather them all and let me take a look.” Zhao Yunlan puts down the phone and walks over. “Ai, speaking of which, what kind of code word is ‘Thank you Teacher Shen’? Why is everyone coming in saying that?”

Shen Wei says, “Ugh…”

Chu Shuzhi says, “It’s for the red pockets Teacher Shen’s been gifting — Duanwu holiday bonus, right?”

Zhao Yunlan takes the phone out of Shen Wei’s hands to have a look. Within the time he took his call, Student Shen Wei has firmly grasped the concept of mobile payments. He even seriously worked in some after class practice — he went through his contact list and sent out a red pocket to every person in the bureau.

It’s not even a group red pocket, a free for all battle, first come first served. Teacher Zhao hasn’t managed to teach that lesson. He’s sent them out one by one.

He’s gone through half the contact list and still has the other half left, but there’s no money left in his account.

Their Teacher Shen treats money like game money — instant redeeming, the kind that doesn’t require exchange to virtual dollars.

Zhao Yunlan is silent.

Shen Wei silently questions.

“No…thing,” Zhao Yunlan drags the word out to two miles, and from outside the two miles sends back a painful smile, “If you don’t have money I’ll send you some. Don’t leave the other half, keep sending them until you’re done. Ah,” he laughs, “You’re a fast learner.”

[TN. A 裡 / li is a Chinese mile, in modern times, it is half of a km.]

And in this way at this year’s Duanwu, everyone still received their holiday bonus, sponsored by a certain Mr. Zhao. They were all extremely thankful.

(2)

All of the problematic registration forms has been piled into the basement. Though the light isn’t on, it isn’t dark, either; the faint silvery glow of the forms gathered together rivals an entire row of fluorescent tubes.

Wang Zheng and Sangzan works into daylight overtime. When Zhao Yunlan and his group comes down the stairs, they’d just finished grouping the forms by tribe and area.

The registration forms were elegantly designed, sent out in white envelopes with a little stamp, and all of them were made by Shen Wei. The form belongs to whomever can open the seal, and if someone else takes it they won’t be able to record anything in it. It’s the equivalent of a written exam — as a standard written exam would be impractical. For one, each person has their own speciality, for two, lots of experts hiding in the forests and the mountains to train can’t read simplified Chinese.

Sangzan says, “Zhao Ju, Speaking Of Which, we have sent out 729 registration forms, and At This Very Moment we have received just over 1560.”

[TN. Sangzan is using unnecessary 4-character idioms. When he does, I capitalise the words.]

Zhao Yunlan says, “The difference is that much?”

Sangzan sighs, “Yes, What A Splendid Sight.”

Zhao Yunlan doesn’t say anything.

Brother Sangzan has been exceedingly ambitious in his years working for the S.I.D, studious in his studies. By now his spoken Mandarin is already clear and concise and he’s discarded the terrible nickname of “jieba,” so having raised standards for himself he’s teaching himself idioms, often tries to quote old texts wholesale. Thus began another round of trying his colleagues’ patience.

[TN. The word 結巴 / Stammer is pronounced Jiēbā. Daqing used to call Sangzan this, and when asked what it meant, Daqing replied that it’s an honorific denoting respect. 潔扒 / Jiébā was how Sangzan mispronounced the word for stammer. It doesn’t mean anything.]

Zhao Yunlan is nearly used to this already, and with familiar ease disregards all the four-character words out of Sangzan’s mouth, waving dismissively to say, “You’ve worked hard.”

“Where Be Such Reasoning? It wasn’t hard at all,” Sangzan answers with a smile. “I Own Nothing But What I Need, and what I am able to contribute is merely A Hair From the Backs of Nine Bulls.”

Zhao Yunlan feels as though his life is being shortened, but Wang Zheng doesn’t seem to care as she stands to the side with an indulgent expression, only know to look at him and smile like an idiot.

“Whatever, as long as you’re happy.” Zhao Yunlan says helplessly, “Hurry up and clock out, you two.”

Shen Wei’s ‘watermark’ isn’t something that just anyone can make bootleg copies of — not to mention to imitate it so expertly. During the time Zhao Yunlan and Sangzan had their conversation, he already managed to flip through all of the forms.

Chu Shuzhi says, “Teacher Shen, what do you think? Honestly, I can’t tell the difference.”

Shen Wei doesn’t make a sound; after contemplating a moment he makes a waving gesture and the glowing registration forms scatter like butterflies, moving away from the order Wang Zheng and Sangzan’s sorted them in. In a confusion of light and shadow the forms fall into two piles, one obviously thicker than the other.

Zhao Yunlan pulls on his pants’ cuffs and half crouches, checking a few out of each stack. He points at the thicker pile and asks, “All of these are identical?”

Shen Wei nods.

Listening in, Chu Shuzhi is confused. “And if it’s not? If they’re identical doesn’t that mean you can’t tell if it’s fake?”

“No,” Shen Wei says. “He means the seal on top of each envelope.”

Even though every seal on each envelope looks exactly the same, the method to open them are different. This way, they can sort among the talents and the abilities of each, and it prevents the registrants from comparing their answers with each other.

When they sent out the registration forms, the different types of seals were sent out according to the tribes. For example, the snake tribes favour water, and opening the seal requires burning it with the Samadhi true flame, forcing the registrant to do something they wouldn’t want to do.

Of course, all the seals of the returning envelopes have already been broken, but the scent left behind is enough for its creator to see the problem — every seal in the thicker stack of forms are identical, obviously made by taking one and making duplicates.

Shen Wei says, “When we sent out the forms, I left a trace on each and every one. We can figure out which sect or tribe we’ve sent this one to.”

Chu Shuzhi stares, wide-eyed and shocked. “No way … wait a second! Seven hundred odd forms, every single one is different? And you’ve left an identifying trace?”

“Mmhmm.” Shen Wei adjusts his glasses. “What about it?”

Chu Shuzhi is silent.

No wonder the bureau has never mentioned requisitioning labour costs for their consultant; if they get charged the market rate, it seems they would only be able to afford him by selling off Kunlun Jun.

With a clue, the rest is easy. After a simple check of their records, they find out that the problematic form went to a yao tribe — the water tribes of the South China Sea.

Zhao Yunlan stands. “Tell Zhu Hong to call her Sishu.”

In general, the yao tribes are separated into birds, beasts, water-dwelling, and the ascended, which is to say: ones that fly in the sky, ones that run on the earth, ones that swim in the water, then there are the stones, grass, and trees that’s gained spirits. Those are then sorted into specific types, each with a place they call home.

Because the S.I.B.'s Zhu Hong is a part of the snake tribe and their leader Sishu is quite capable, treats his work and private matters as separate entities, the snake tribes can be said to have someone on the inside, but knows to not exploit their position, and he’s become especially respected. In a few short years he’s already become the leader of the yoa tribes, and whenever something goes wrong with the yao tribes, they speak to the She Sishu.

Not even five minutes after the She Sishu takes his niece’s phone call, he’s braved the blazing sun to arrive at 9 University Road. He’s briefed, and apologising formally to Kunlun Jun, knows he hasn’t face to ask for more registration forms. Turning, the old man personally rolls up his sleeves — heading off to the South China Sea to catch the bastard.

[3]

“Actually it is rather strange, if you think about it,” Shen Wei says as he slices up ham in the kitchen after they’ve come home. “There are mountains beyond mountains, talents I cannot imagine, so I can’t absolutely guarantee something I make can’t be duplicated. But that envelope is quite simple, and a real expert would be able to tell every seal is different. Why would they do something so stupid as to make hundreds of copies?”

Zhao Yunlan leans uselessly on the kitchen counter; he never helps, only ever gets in the way. He picks pieces of ham off the the cutting board to snack on as Shen Wei slices. “What about a holy artefact? The pollution in these times hasn’t helped the quality of the yao tribes any, but each tribe has their own history — maybe some holy item passed down from their ancestors.”

Shen Wei finishes slicing the ham, and after a moment of silent contemplation turns to get a plate. “But I can’t think about what it could be, right now …”

Something so amazing it can duplicate the seal of a natural ghost king, and to use it to do something as silly as this — what holy artefact could it be?

Creator God Pangu branded Photocopier?

By the time he turns around with a plate for the sliced ham, Shen Wei discovers that someone’s taken all the ham off the cutting board.

Shen Wei doesn’t say anything.

Zhao Yunlan follows his gaze like he’s slow on the uptake, and chewing with lightning speed swallows the ‘evidence.’ He stretches like a cat, as if the case of the missing ham has nothing to do with him at all.

Shen Wei asks, “… It’s not too salty?”

He hears a sound like a click in his chest before Zhao Yunlan escapes the kitchen fearing the repercussion of his crimes, and both of them turn to look toward the southern skies.

Shen Wei asks, “What was that?”

“I don’t know, but …” Zhao Yunlan squints. “It feels like the three sovereigns. Wai, Zhu Hong?”

[TN. The era of the three sovereigns and five emperors. In Zhen Hun, there was a battle between the three sovereigns and 蚩尤/Chiyou. I’ll link all the myths at the end of this.]

“Lao Zhao, something’s happened to my Sishu!”

“Calm down, tell me slowly.”

“Didn’t he leave for the South China Sea? The tribe just sent news, the leader’s life lamp has suddenly gone out! My Sishu he …”

“Don’t panic,” Zhao Yunlan says. “When a yao as great as he falls there would be visions — it wouldn’t be without a trace like this. Maybe he’s had a bit of an accident and his connection with his life lamp’s been severed. Let’s do this — have the snake tribe bring your Sishu’s life lamp, and I’ll go look for him with Shen Wei.”

They don’t have time to eat dinner properly so Shen Wei hurriedly stuffs their half prepared ingredients into the fridge. It looks like they’ll just have to order in when they come back later.

Another elder from the snake tribe sends over She Sishu’s life lamp. Zhao Yunlan and Shen Wei shortens the distance into a mere inch, and within the blink of an eye they arrive at the South China Sea.

Ever since the tourist industry began developing the South China Sea, the water tribe’s shrimp soldiers and crab commanders, useless to begin with, has somehow gotten worse. The little yao, seduced by the twin promises of sunny beaches and palm trees, spend their days wearing tropical swim trunks to pass their days among the humans. But the humans finish their vacations and go back to work and school, do what they’re supposed to do, while these dumbass little yao simply follow the next set of tourists and continue to play around. Their cultivation has flat-lined, and even their study towards enlightenment has been delayed as they sun their shrimp shells and fish scales to a golden malt.

It stands to reason that when the snake tribe’s leader make a personal visit, this gang of under-trained garbage must greet him with a banner. Which sea urchin gave them the courage to rebel?

[TN. 海膽 / Sea urchin is written literally “sea gallbladder.” In English, you say someone with courage as having “guts,” in Chinese, you say they have “gallbladder.”]

Could it be their daily chore of sitting on the shore drinking fresh water has done something to their osmotic pressure, and their gall’s gone swollen?

Anyway, Zhao Yunlan can’t figure it out.

When they arrive at the South China Sea, it is to find the water tribes there in disarray; when they heard that Kunlun Jun and the Ghost King Dianxia has come for them, the ones in charge of the tribes started pissing themselves. They’re all kneeling on the sand, in their shorts and bare arms, faces towards the sand and backs to the sky; each person’s back has been tattooed a single word, and strung together it reads, “This generation has committed sins worthy of ten thousand deaths, to the gods above we offer an apology.”

[TN. Dianxia is an honorific for kings/queens]

It’s such an amazing sight even the hermit crabs dare not show their faces.

“Get up. What are you all doing? We’re here to talk. Stop being so embarrassing!” Zhao Yunlan sits at the edge of a cloud, and so struck by the sight he can feel a constant pulse at his temple — they can’t even get down, there isn’t any space on the beach. “I don’t get it. It’s been a hundred years since we buried such an archaic cultural practice — how is it that it’s still intact among you yao tribes? Think before you act!”

The South China Sea is rich in resources, the seafood … no, the types of yao belonging to the water tribes varied, and this branch of the water tribe tend to live all mixed together, with the tribe leaders forming an alliance. The alliance’s director is a 3000 year old big turtle, with the vice director being a 2500 year old sea cucumber.

the two directors are a golden partnership without conflict, and Zhao Yunlan listens to the weepy sounding report as they relate the cause of the problem but only manages to get through half of it before he feels his immortal soul go eight turns around the thirty-six mountains and valleys — his gaze going unfocused — and for the first time feels as though their Guo Changcheng is a smart and cunning boy.

It must be difficult, but Shen Wei listens to the end. “That is to say, your honourable tribe leader in charge of watching over the forbidden sanctuary did not receive a registration form, and in indignation he stole one and used the sanctuary to make a large number of copies?”

The sea turtle director says, sighing, “Yes, that person’s original form was a barracuda, and they sold the fake registration forms making massive profits. He used the proceeds to buy areca nuts in bulk and has already gone on the run.”

“…It doesn’t matter what he bought in bulk, let’s leave that aside for now.” Shen Wei says, “Is it convenient for us to know what your honourable tribe is holding in the sanctuary? How were the registration forms duplicated?”

The sea cucumber answers with a bitter expression. “Your honour, aside from generations of barracuda charged with watching the sanctuary, none of us yao dare approach the area. According to the ancestors, an old holy artefact was sealed away there. Right — the leader of the snake tribes has come by, said he didn’t understand our explanation at all and insisted on investigating the sanctuary. We didn’t dare keep him, but not long after he went inside, the South China Sea had a sudden and huge quake, and he never came back. We still don’t know what happened!”

Shen Wei tuns his head so he could meet Zhao Yunlan’s gaze, and Zhao Yunlan wakes from his nap, straightening his back. “Ai, then quit blabbering and lead the way.”

By this time, the night has darkened. It is not yet Duanwu and the moon is hidden, the sea heavy and thick seeming, but it looks like something restless and gigantic has awoken in the deep, causing unending waves that seem to resonate with the beating of Zhao Yunlan’s heart. They’re still more than two hundred miles from the sanctuary, but the two directors from the water tribes are already so terrified their faces have turned white, and cannot be convinced to go another step.

The vice-director says, “In the past we dared to patrol the sanctuary during the holidays, but from the day that stinking fish moved what it ought not, the sanctuary has become more horrifying day by day. At first, it was only the ten miles outside it, and now over a hundred miles, we can’t — can’t breathe …”

As he says this, the vice director’s eyes roll and turn white and they sinks into the water as if they’re lacking in both blood and air. The blade in Shen Wei’s hand flashes like a dark shadow, and the Zhanhun blade appears, then in the blink of an eye stretches to dozens of feet long. With the scabbard still on, he promptly fishes up the sea cucumber from the deep.

Director sea turtle has no time to bother with politeness just now, and with a quick fist in hand bow changes into their natural form, picks up their partner, and swims away quick as a torpedo.

Two dark shadows quickly skim over the undercurrent towards the South China Sea forbidden sanctuary.

The nearer they get to the sanctuary, the quieter the water becomes, and as they near at the fifty mile mark, the surface becomes unnaturally still, as if an invisible hand is flattening it by force until there isn’t even a ripple, until the water seem stagnant.

Very quickly, Zhao Yunlan and Shen Wei arrives at the heart of the sanctuary. There’s a strange whirlpool here, its diameter no wider than two metres, spinning rapidly, and like a needle it pierces all the way down to the sea floor. There’s a saying that even the sharpest blade cannot part water, but the water within and the water without looks like it’s been parted with something — The inside spins at breakneck speed; the outside doesn’t move a hair.

There’s a hint of darkness woven into the air above the whirlpool, calling Shen Wei’s Zhanhun blade — they’re as related as waters that flow from the same stream.

“If it’s a holy artefact left behind by some god during the time of chaos, it could very well react negatively with me.” Shen Wei says, “If they’d tried to copy anything else it may have been fine, but that registration form carried a trace of me. It must have provoked what’s sealed here — loosened the seal… And when She Sishu rushed in here he must have added flame to the fuel. I think the seal is already mostly broken — do you have any inkling of what’s in here?”

Zhao Yunlan creases his eyebrows and thinks for a while before shaking his head. “I haven’t seen it, but …”

Something inside the briefcase in his hand suddenly flashes; it’s She Sishu’s life lamp, brightening. A life lamp is actually a candle protected by a dragon pearl; it’s like a crystal lamp, shuddering as if it’s about to stop breathing. Its weak light falls onto the surface of the sea and quickly gathers into a line, pointing towards the whirlpool.

Soon after, the dragon pearl outside the life lamp cracks without warning, and quickly disintegrates. Its feeble flame jumps once, and Zhao Yunlan instinctively tries to protect it with his hand, but the whirlpool on the water suddenly explodes in all directions, and the stars above scatter like dust in a storm. Nearly at once, Shen Wei pulls Zhao Yunlan close behind him with a sweeping arm and wields his blade like a shield in front of them.

But soon Shen Wei can feel that something is wrong — his hand did not touch Zhao Yunlan.

Shen Wei turns to look in surprise, and finds that though they are barely apart, there is a transparent membrane between them. Zhao Yunlan is saying something, but his voice can’t reach him, so Shen Wei can only read his lips. He’s saying, “These bubbles are …”

Bubbles?

Shen Wei looks all around him. She Sishu’s life lamp reflects and refracts, light and shadow overlapping. It reveals the countless membranes surrounding them, tight like densely packed soap bubbles. A faint mirage-like shadow can be seen on each ‘bubble,’ and for a shocking moment they can see a million Zhao Yunlan, a million Shen Wei. As the two people in their individual bubbles drifts apart, Shen Wei’s eyes redden, and he unsheathes the Zhanhun blade, immediately cutting at whatever’s between them.

With a sudden boom, the Zhanhun blade that can cut through anything feels as though it’s been stuck in thick mud, and countless strange ‘bubbles’ are shattered by that single stroke. But many more ‘bubbles’ are rising from the sea floor as waves high as mountains crowd the surface of the sea. With a sharp and loud sound like an axe wielded by Pangu parting chaos to form the sky and sea, the mountains shakes and the ocean boils, and Shen Wei’s view darkens —

(4)

When Zhao Yunlan wakes with a start, he’s still holding onto the short candle from a life lamp with a pea-sized flame. He tries to move and is momentarily stunned, a shocked expression flashing across his face.

Slowly, Zhao Yunlan lowers his eyes, his gaze falling onto his right foot … he’s sprained an ankle.

Kunlun Jun’s incarnation is impervious to blades and guns, and neither the cold nor the heat bothers him. Since his god soul awakened six years ago, Zhao Yunlan has forgotten what a mosquito bite looks like. He never imagined he’d end up spraining his ankle at the South China Sea!

On the one hand he’s gritting his teeth over the pain, on the other he finds it rather interesting. He runs a hand over it, determines that it’s not serious, and carefully leans on the wall to stand. As he stands, he realises something is wrong; his arms and legs feels so heavy they don’t seem his own — Kunlun Jun’s ability to move freely between the heavens and the earth and to crush the three realms beneath his feet has simply disappeared.

Not only that, but his Bright-Mirror wristwatch has stopped, the half dozen charm papers left in his wallet has turned into regular newsprint that doesn’t react at all, he can’t summon his bullwhip — and even the Zhenhun Ling bound to his blood is laying in his palm without a hint of life, turned into a perfectly normal plaque of wood.

Zhao Yunlan raises She Sishu’s life lamp and takes a look around him — it’s desolate to the extreme. With a glance he can see that none of the street lamps are lit, and the street is lined on both sides by uneven, half broken down houses, and the air is thick with dust.

It’s like an old ruin.

He takes a couple of unsteady steps before he has to stop, shaking out the sand in his shoes. Each breath feels like acupuncture, needles pricking at his lungs, and an ache in his heart come and goes, making it hard to breathe. When he was a mortal, Zhao Yunlan can’t say he was perfectly healthy, but he wasn’t plagued with illnesss either … maybe he’s become unused to mortality?

Zhao Yunlan, dragging his somewhat heavy body, walks around the street once. His cell phone has no signal as he checks the time.

20:45.

The little plate of ham he pinched from the cutting board before dinner had been barely enough to fill the gaps between his teeth, and after the sprained ankle and the aching chest, this mortal body is making him remember what it feels like to have stomach problems.

He hears something go “meow” and sees a black cat jumping from the branch of a dead tree near him onto a roof, padding delicately over the broken up stones on the top of a wall, tail raised high and in no hurry at all. From every angle it looks like little Daqing — with a neck and a waist and all, a picture of the youthful days before he got fat!

Zhao Yunlan has a habit of calling cats and dogs whenever he sees them, so he whistles at the cat. In the moment the cat’s green eyes turn his way, Zhao Yunlan notices it holding a paper charm in its mouth. Before he’s able to have a good look, the sky and the earth suddenly spins — the cat disappears, the street twists and warps, and Zhao Yunlan loses his footing as though stepping on air, falling heavily towards the ground. His right foot, pain finally fading from the last fall, twists again.

Zhao Yunlan hisses in pain, then he’s stunned to find out he’s right back where he woke the last time.

He helps himself up against the same wall, and barely walks a step before he feels that something doesn’t feel right with his feet — the sand he’s spilled out of his shoes are back.

Zhao Yunlan’s pupils shrink a bit as he realises something, and taking out his phone, he checks the time.

20:35.

This is … ten minutes ago?

Zhao Yunlan takes quick steps along the street, holding onto his phone to keep track of the time. Ten minutes later, sure enough, that black cat appears again in the same pose, jumping out from the same place. This time, Zhao Yunlan doesn’t try to catch the attention of the magical cat, but stays in the corner to observe for a bit instead.

The cat holding a charm in its mouth raises a paw and takes five steps … and the sky-spinning-street-warping feeling is back!

Again, Zhao Yunlan returns to ten minutes ago.

This goes on for two, three times, and Zhao Yunlan doesn’t even bother standing up again — it’s not easy taking off these shoes.

This world is like a repeating song; the song is about 10 minutes, the space within isn’t overly large, either. He’s been trapped within these 10 minutes, time cycling over and over again.

Zhao Yunlan runs his hand along the wall, and he thinks about the strange ‘bubbles’ he saw when he was separated from Shen Wei.

‘Bubbles’ … time that goes in a cycle …

Suddenly, Zhao Yunlan stands, and again he pours the sand out of his shoes, and this time, he runs through the desolately empty streets. In the very moment that cat appears, he clamps onto the life lamp with his mouth and takes a running start, grabbing the edge of the roof so he can run up the short wall onto the roof. With one arm he sweeps up the spitting, angry cat, and digs the paper charm out of its mouth, flipping over for a landing. Before his feet hit the ground the time for space and time to orient back to its starting point has nearly come. Zhao Yunlan quickly moves the paper charm onto the flame of the life lamp. It catches fire. At the same time, Zhao Yunlan hears a bang next to his ear as if something has shattered, and the cat in his hand turns into a spiral of pale smoke.

Zhao Yunlan stumbles for a few steps, and when he looks up again he discovers that he hasn’t been sent to the starting point — the street in front of him has undergone some subtle changes. A single street lamp has been lit, the air is far less dusty, the tree is no longer bare. Though it only gained a few leaves, it is at least alive.

Zhao Yunlan brushes off the dust on his clothes. “Is that so.” He sucks his teeth, says, “I thought there was some treasure here in the South China Sea, but no, I find only problems.”

Everyone knows that you can’t actually turn back time, and a person can’t run wild over their own timeline. By the same token, cause and effect is unbreakable.

Before Kunlun Jun returned to his altar, Zhao Yunlan once travelled back eleven years to 2002, but in reality that wasn’t true time travel. It was the agricultural god Shennong taking an eleven year reincarnation wheel and storing it in a scale of Nuwa, the half snake mother goddess. The “little wheel” was a world like a mustard seed moulded by Shennong: a world much like our own but only an illusion. He’s taken a turn in a mustard seed.

[DN. 壬午年 is utterly untranslatable but it’s 2002, okay? See: sexagenary cycle. ‘Mustard seed world’ is likely named for the parable of the Sumeru mountain contained in a mustard seed, or ‘The Sumeru Mountain contains a mustard seed, and a mustard seed contains the Sumeru Mountain’ and the ending of THAT story states that the worlds are ever-changing and therefore unreal.]

Back then, when She Sishu passed the Nuwa scale to him, Zhao Yunlan walked into this mustard seed on his own without suspicion. The time in the seed cycles and so Zhao Yunlan flows along with the wheel, arriving at eleven years ago … until Shen Wei used the Zhanhun blade to cut the seed open from the outside, dragging him back to reality.

The ‘bubble’ that separated him and Shen Wei must be just like the little wheel that was eleven years long — every ‘bubble’ is a world undergoing a repeating segment of time.

There exist simple worlds that cycles every ten minutes, and there also could be worlds that cycle only once a million years, infinitely realistic, vast and infinitely complex.

So this isn’t any sort of ‘holy artefact’ at all. When the ancient gods were trying to create the true reincarnation wheel they’d gone down the wrong road, and this is the left over garbage from their experiments, sealed away in the South China Sea — unexpectedly disturbed by the Ghost King’s life force via this copy incident, and then crashed into by a great yao, causing it to resurface in the human world.

Zhao Yunlan raises his head to look at the street lamp, and thinks, “I knew it — none of you would leave me any actual inheritance. You all only ever leave me messes that need cleaning up.”

Now, he has no idea which year and month Shen Wei’s been stolen off to; it would be impractical to expect his blade as reinforcement. Each of these endlessly repeating worlds can only be broken through from the inside.

This isn’t difficult — each mustard seed has a connection with reality, and it is from this connection that Zhao Yunlan can enter from the outside. Find it, break it, and the seed will have nothing to cling to, and disappear like a flame after it dies.

For example, the ‘connecting point’ of the eleven-year wheel from back then was the mysterious book, ‘Unusual Ancient Legends.’

At the time, the Zhao Yunlan from the real world had one, and there was another one in the little Wheel. When he brought the book into the little Wheel, the two identical ‘Unusual Ancient Legends’ became one, the seed world and the real world ‘sticking’ together; illusion and reality overlapping.

That Zhao Yunlan urgently wanted to find out what Shen Wei was hiding from him, and followed the book desperately without any thought of destroying it. But if, when he’d acquired the ‘Unusual Ancient Legends’ in the little Wheel, he’d burned it, the cause and effect of the little wheel would have seriously departed from the cause and effect of reality, and the world within the wheel would disappear like smoke, not needing Shen Wei to cut through it with his blade.

If he’d burned the copy of ‘Unusual Ancient Legends’ from inside the wheel and returned to reality, the real book should still be in his hands, and wouldn’t forever stay in the little wheel to cycle forever.

As for the real ‘Unusual Ancient Legends,’ it was in all likelihood sneaked into the S.I.D. by Shennong Bo.

Now, these overlapping mustard seed worlds look like ‘bubbles,’ with Zhao Yunlan’s shadows projected into them, and each one would duplicate something he carries, becoming the ‘connecting point’ between each seed world and reality: his stopped Bright-Mirror wristwatch, the paper charm that’s now wastepaper, the Zhenhun Ling becoming normal wood, the bullwhip he cannot summon … even the immortality of Kunlun Jun.

Zhao Yunlan doesn’t know which object each world corresponds to, he can only search them one by one. He has to destroy something in each world and destroy the seed before that object will follow him back into reality.

“This is so much trouble,” Zhao Yunlan sighs. “If I knew this would happen I would have just gone back and organised an exam.”

This is all because of the imprudence of the South China Sea water tribes; when he gets back, he’s going to have a feast of sea food at a street food stall.

(5)

Zhao Yunlan has already forgotten how long he has lingered in countless seeds.

In the beginning, all the seeds were only simple scenes: a single broken down street, a dark and sunless city, the suburbs, underwater … and there were no other people at all. The cycle of time was as short as ten minutes and as long as three days, and what they duplicated were just small, inconsequential things.

But soon afterwards the seeds became more and more complicated, more and more immense, and other people began to appear, even the people he knows — for example, the seed that was about his Bright-Mirror wristwatch cycled for a full three years, the setting being Zhao Yunlan’s previous incarnation, living in the early years of the Republic.

The Bright-Mirror was passed down by the last Lord Zhenhun, or his last incarnation. He was chasing a kidnapper then, a mountain ghost or demon, and in the process shattered the face of his watch. The hostage was a child from an orphanage, and a man who proclaimed himself the Dean of the orphanage rushed to him and took away the child, and, on seeing that his watch was broken, told him he knew a good craftsman and he could have it fixed. When it’s returned the watch was already able to see between yin and yang, had become the magical treasure ‘Bright Mirror.’

Zhao Yunlan, observing coldly from the outside, watches the incarnation who shares his face slowly realise what’s happened to his watch, thus running off to the orphanage to find the dean only to find out that the dean is a short and stout nun and not at all the same person who took his watch away.

“Shen Wei ah,” Zhao Yunlan follows his past life, thinking of the origin of his watch, shaking his head and can’t help laughing, “you sneaky son of a gun.”

The repeating time loops become longer and longer, and when it exceeds fifty years, Zhao Yunlan finds himself no longer an observer of a seed world, but rather a part of it with his own identity, following the movie script of the world.

What happens in each seed world isn’t necessary from his memory; there are some that are very much like the memory of an incarnation with some subtle changes, and some are utterly strange and wonderfully new with flashes of familiarity in between. Zhao Yunlan prefers the latter, because in the five thousand years of memories of the time he spent in the wheel of reincarnation, Shen Wei made few appearances. On the rare occasion that they run into each other, he only catches a glimpse before Shen Wei is gone. But in the fabricated worlds, Shen Wei wears different identities and spends lifetimes by his side until they each find the object that breaks open the world … the real Shen Wei — as expected, Shen Wei’s Zhanhun blade has already been trapped inside. But even if he has the blade, he doesn’t dare use it, because if the world breaks from the outside, the duplicated item will become just like the book ‘Unusual Ancient Legend,’ forever left behind in this particular wheel.

Zhao Yunlan breaks through eighty mustard seeds. Each time he leaves one behind, the time reverts back to 20:35.

It feels like he has already lived through every life possible in the blink of an eye.

Fortunately, Kunlun Jun’s immortal soul was forged through a million years of reincarnation, and his mind remains as clear as when he took his first step. Finally, he arrives at the eighty-first seed.

Eighty-one, or nine by nine.

Zhao Yunlan has a premonition that this should be the very last world. Shen Wei is here too, but they couldn’t imagine that the cycle of time here runs as long as ten thousand years. The long stretch of time makes this feel real, and its binding force boundlessly strong. As he approaches the end of time, Zhao Yunlan still hasn’t found this world’s connecting point.

Everything he’s brought into these worlds, large and small — including the blood he carries in his heart and the bones of his spine — has already been shattered in the various Wheels. What could it be?

What is left?

(6)

Oh, right. His very self is what’s left.

The ego is enslaved by the physical body.

The heart is but a slave to material ambitions.

(7)

Zhao Yunlan emerges from the very last seed, and the world shakes as if a hundred thousand mountains are jumping like birds. A giant wave descend as though coming from the nine heavens, and the water parts before him like it wishes to make for him a road, to let the chaos-era mountain god rise between them.

At the same time, a sound like a shrill wind whistles by his ear and the Zhanhun blade appears out of nowhere to land on the ocean’s surface, the entire South China Sea looks about to be sliced in two. Zhao Yunlan suddenly opens his eyes, reaching into the rolling waves for the hand holding the blade. “Shen Wei!”

The giant wave recedes, revealing Shen Wei’s silhouette, looking even more distressed than him. At first glance Shen Wei seems like he hasn’t woken from the endless reincarnations, and for a while he doesn’t say anything.

“It’s alright,” Zhao Yunlan says quietly. “We’re back.”

Shen Wei falters, stumbling into him, strength leaving his body. His Zhanhun blade flutters downwards — onto the back of a giant snake, surfacing from the deep.

Oh good, Zhao Yunlan lets out a breath. She Sishu’s life lamp is still lit and the old wyrm is alive and well. Zhu Hong can keep sticking around at the S.I.B. to muddle up a salary and not have to be dragged back for a succession.

(8)

“Oh? Oh … oh! Then okay, that’s great.”

Early morning in the offices of 9 University Road, one can hear Guo Changcheng’s tone change many, many times. From shock, to helplessness … to embarrassment — Guo Changcheng says into the phone, embarrassed, “There isn’t anything I want, thank you leader. Really, I really don’t need … anything from the duty-free shop, you don’t need to worry about it, what’s important is that you have fun … ai, have fun, have a good vacation …”

Before he’s even finished passing on the last blessing, Chu Shuzhi and Lin Jing have already slapped their desks and are standing in anger, and Daqing has turned into an angry ball of fur.

Chu Shuzhi says, “Is that Lao Zhao — what did he mean? What do you mean good vacation? Is he serious?”

Lin Jing says, “He ran away? He just dropped everything and left? Where be the laws of the heavens?”

Daqing up jumps from the couch. “Why that shameless son of a — give me the phone.”

Guo Changcheng puts down the receiver apologetically. “He, he already hung up.”

Daqing roars, “Call him back! If he doesn’t pick up then call Teacher Shen!”

Predictably, Zhao Yunlan habitually turns off his phone after he hangs up.

But none of them can predict that —

Shen Wei stands barefoot on the beach, one hand clutching his collar, the other wrapped around his belt. His cheeks are already red from struggling, but he’d rather die than follow the local custom and change into a pair of swim trunks.

What is this? Such impropriety! Such indecency!

Zhao Yunlan runs after him. “Just try it, if you don’t try it how can you say it’s not a good thing? I promise you’ll like it. Shen Wei, Xiao Wei, my darling treasure … Doesn’t it bore you wearing black from head to toe all the time? This could be a gateway into a new world … Ai! Fine, you don’t have to wear it if you don’t want to, no need to throw yourself into the ocean!”

Shen Wei, having been forced to the edge of the water, steps into the sea, his cell phone falling out of his pocket right on time for an incoming call. It rings once before the cell phone heroically sacrifices itself, the screen going black.

At 9 University Road, Gua Changcheng announces with an innocent expression, “Teacher Shen has hung up.”

“Meow —” Daqing collapses and yells, “How can Teacher Shen with his big eyes in such an honest face be capable of betraying us?!”

[TN. “沒想到你個濃眉大眼的都叛變革命了” / “I did not imagine a person like you with such thick eyebrows and big eyes would end up becoming a rebel” is a quote… from a 90’s movie.]

myths: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pangu https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nüwa https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shennong https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kunlun_(mythology) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chiyou https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Flood_(China)

Anyway, that’s the entire thing, translated once, checked twice, feel free to send asks if unclear about anything. (You are not bothering me at all by asking me about the thing I love.)

#鎮魂 #zhen hun #鎮魂番外四 #Guardian #translation #Zhen Hun extra 4 #fox translates 鎮魂 #fox translates zhen hun

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foxghost · 6 years

Text

鎮魂 Guardian [Zhen Hun] extra 2 full translation

Warning(s): single use of a slur, lots of Buddhism, novel ending spoilers / explanation [TN: the other extras are here, you may want to check out #4 for notes on names.] Original Chinese character count: 3068 English Translation word count: 3058 Much thanks to @lady-eden for the final once-over.

A comparatively serious demon-raising incident affecting a certain city in the southern part of the country needed the attention of Chu Shuzhi. He takes Guo Changcheng with him. They spend nearly a whole month there before the incident can be considered perfectly resolved, and the two return to 4 Bright Road.

Guo Changcheng is still as unskilled as he ever was. There are times when everyone feels that Guo Changcheng and their office’s newest member, Xiao Mi, cannot be any more alike.

Oh right, forgot to mention: Xiao Mi is a one year and some old Samoyed dog with an outsized appetite and an undersized intelligence.

It started with a lost dog delivered to the neighbourhood police station, living there for over a month. Though the owner never came back to claim him, it did manage to eat everyone poor. After a few more twists and turns, Zhao Yunlan manages to gain possession of the dog and to keep it at 4 Bright Road in an attempt to divert Daqing’s gloominess on seeing Lao Li.

The whole day through Xiao Mi eats when it should eat, drinks when it should drink, doesn’t ever take anything to heart. Before Chu Shizhi left for the assignment, he spent more than a month with much effort teaching this dog the two tricks of ‘sit’ and ‘shake,’ only to discover it had discarded the only two skills it possessed on Java Island by the time he gets back. Other than to stare blankly with two giant innocent eyes and run around humping legs, its brain seems entirely empty and devoid of dog tricks.

[TN: “Java Island” is a way to say “not even on the map anymore” or “gone”]

In the way that so many skills seem unteachable to the both of them, it does look very much like Guo Changcheng and Xiao Mi belonged to the same family eight hundred years ago.

[TN: There’s a saying that people with the same last names are “五百年前是一家” / belonged to the same family 500 years ago. The number varies.]

But none of it takes away from how he’s in possession of a holy artefact.

The catastrophic rupturing of chaos decimated Difu, and Shen Wei near single-handedly sets up the new order. The sheep skin he wears covers him quite well and he rarely makes an appearance, nor does he meddle in the new administration’s affairs, but the new Difu, given a new lease on life by the wolf that is Shen Wei, dares not treat him with less than the respect he’s due. The Zhanhun-shi that all three realms yielded to now yields more power than ever, so naturally his habit of collecting the remnants of lone souls and wild ghosts passes without the merest notice, all to the advantage of Guo Changcheng’s little stun baton.

If one takes some time and considers that Guo Chancheng tends to turn into a trembling bald chicken whenever he runs into danger, how he always manages to turn fear into sheer power feels rather miraculous.

When Chu Shizhi returns to the office, he ignores all of his paperwork in favour of watching the stock market and studying the candlestick chart while wearing a grave expression, leaving Guo Changcheng to patiently post invoices and fill in expense reports. He goes to find Zhao Yunlan so he can sign the paperwork, but unexpectedly finds the opposite office door locked — Zhao Yunlan isn’t here.

Guo Changcheng scratches his head. He asks innocently, “Zhao Chu isn’t here?”

Zhu Hong doesn’t bother looking up from her computer. “Officially, our new office lease is finalized today and he’s gone to do final inspection and put his signature on things. He thought he may as well move today too — dammit, why is everything so slow? I sincerely hope the net is faster where we’re moving.”

Poor Xiao Mi’s being chased by a little cat all over the room, but Daqing brakes to a stop from his bullying when he hears this. The black cat raises his head to speak, “What about unofficially?”

With an odd tone carrying both longing and a distant ache, Zhu Hong says, “His man fucked him so hard he can’t get out of bed obviously.”

Not about to disappoint, Guo Changcheng is so shocked by these words he ends up sitting down crookedly, and the chair rolls away from beneath him, leaving him to crash solidly onto the floor.

Zhu Hong glances dismissively at Guo Changcheng, telegraphing what a fuss about nothing, and sucks her teeth at him. “Our leader is a faggot, what are you so surprised about — ai, is everyone’s net slow? This is so infuriating."

Chu Shuzhi comments, “It’s pretty slow.”

The one taking up all the bandwidth playing an online game is Lin Jing, and he keeps quiet through all of this pretending to be invisible. He doesn’t stay invisible for long though, and as quickly as he’s discovered, Zhu Hong beats him up.

As punishment, they disconnect Lin Jing’s computer from the network and he’s left to waste his time away by playing an offline game called Plant vs. Zombies.

… and that’s why it’s Chu Shuzhi’s turn to beat him up now.

[TN. a reminder: Chu is a Chinese zombie, which I suppose is like both a zombie and a vampire, by western standards.]

Head in his arms, Lin Jing drapes himself over his desk, tearily saying, “These days are so hard to get through.”

Chu Shuzhi orders, “I see you’re so devoid of work you have dan teng. Xiao Guo, don’t bother writing that report. Give it to someone who has nothing to do.”

[TN. 蛋疼 / dan teng, literally ‘egg pain’ is something like a headache, but it’s closer to the saying, ‘that makes my testicles hurt.’ You can use it in place of the word headache about things/people/situations that gives you a headache, BUT the word differs from a headache in that it is also used for boredom. So bored your testicles hurt. I have no idea where this came from but you don’t need to have testicles to say it. It’s also used in sentences like “that has dan teng to do with me” in which case it’s just a mildly crass way of saying ‘nothing.’]

Guo Ghangcheng looks over at Lin Jing, and finds him tearfully taking a selfie to capture his ‘as rain on pear blossoms’ look, and laughs, not unkindly. “Don’t worry about it. I’ll write it.”

Lin Jing, pooled on his desk, steals a glimpse of Guo Changcheng, and after a while, does it again.

Guo Changcheng is sitting there typing quietly, slow and meticulous the way he does everything, not a hair out of place. Lin Jing, watching him, finally can’t suppress his curiosity any longer, and with lightning speed he stands just to pluck a hair off Guo Changcheng’s head over his desk.

Guo Changcheng cries out in pain, looks bewilderingly up at him.

Lin Jin gives off a mischievous laugh. “It’s nothing. Just some research.”

“It’ll just give off the smell of burnt protein if you set it on fire,” Chu Shuzhi scoffs, not bothering to look up. “Hair is just a part of the mortal shell. Every reincarnation one gets a new shell. How could it have anything special to it? Your research is skin-deep.”

Lin Jing asks after a pregnant pause, “How did you know what it’d smell like if you set it on fire? Did you already try to burn it?”

Chu Shuzhi ignores him.

“What I still don’t understand,” Lin Jing says, playing with that one strand of Guo Changcheng’s hair, the humour vanishing from his face . “How could such a perfectly normal looking young man be … ai, Xiao Guo, do you think there is anything special about you? Something that’s different from other people?”

They’re not sure how, but everyone’s come to a tacit agreement to not mention anything regarding the Zhenhun Lamp in front of Guo Changcheng. Guo Changcheng stares back at Lin Jing blankly and doesn’t get what he’s saying at all. He shakes his head. “Oh, maybe I’m a bit dumber?”

Lin Jing says ,“But …” and pauses, his voice stopping suddenly.

Kunlun Jun has confirmed that Guo Changcheng is the Zhenhun Lamp’s wick. He’s lived a hundred lifetimes and underwent a hundred calamities and none of it altered his first intentions. The merit accumulated on his soul is a match to Nuwa who created humans, and yet heaven’s given him no blessings and no favours. He has no luck nor fortune; he toils in obscurity ignorant of what he is. Lin Jing’s words fade to silence as he realises he doesn’t want to tell Guo Changcheng about this at all, even if this young man, who lit the last Zhenhun Lamp, who can be said to have finally ended the war between chaos and order, is so extraordinary.

[TN. Merit = positive karma. Good, virtuous actions; every time you choose not to do harm, you gain merit.]

Without a third eye, yet he can always see the truth.

Great Merit, heaven-sent, and yet he remains a nobody.

“But what?” Guo Changcheng asks, puzzled.

“Nothing … I was just wondering how come the sceptre handed down by Kunlun Jun is called ‘Zhenhun-Ling,’” Lin Jing mutters, and he doesn’t wait for Guo Changcheng to figure out what he’s said before he asks, “Oh yeah, what do you do after work?”

[TN. 鎮魂令 zhen / subdue, hun / soul, ling / command]

Guo Changcheng lists off, “Oh, I have to make a delivery to Nana Li’s house, and the Southern Tibet Educational Support Group is working on their summer plans so I’m going there afterwards. I work on things like posters and brochures for them in the evenings.”

Lin Jing’s fingers count unconsciously through his prayer beads. “Hinayama the Lesser Vehicle said that the only person who can help you cross the great river is yourself, but after, Mahayana the Greater Vehicle spoke of ferrying all living things across to reach the shores of enlightenment — come to think of it, I’ve wondered this whole time: Xiao Guo, you’re so busy running around everyday. What do you do it all for?”

[TN. 度 / du literally means “to cross (a river)” and in Buddhism it means to “cross the river to the shores of enlightenment.” It carries the meaning of ‘saving’ or ‘salvation,’ and leads to an ‘escape’ from the Wheel of Reincarnation. What Lin Jing paraphrased is from the Lotus Sutra. 佛自住大乘，如其所得法，定慧力莊嚴，以此度眾生。]

Guo Changcheng says, “I don’t … don’t do it for anything. It’s not like I have anything else to do.”

“Then how do you decide for yourself what to do, and what not to do?” Zhu Hong cuts into the conversation.

Guo Changchen swallows, stretching out his neck like a goose freshly plucked out of the water; he has no idea why everyone suddenly seems interested in him. Maybe he’s seen too many dramas: being the centre of attention always makes Guo Changcheng feel as though he’s acquired a terminal illness, giving him the misconception that he’s not long for the world.

Subconsciously he begins to stammer.

“I, I just don’t do bad things, and occasionally, if there’s something I can help with then I help out. I don’t know anything about anything.” Guo Changcheng’s voice gets smaller and smaller as he speaks, until it naturally becomes as high and quiet as a mosquito.

“I’m suddenly reminded of a saying,” Chu Shuzhi, who’s kept quiet all this time, cuts in. “I saw it on a mural of an old tomb. Impossible to say which era it’s from, now. It said, ‘Men’s hearts harbour corruption, often suffer from worry, hold grudges from anger, commit countless crimes they ought not. Only the three words ‘do no harm’ is the greatest virtue under heaven, and of those who can benefit mankind and subdue souls, there is none other.’”

[TN. priest made this part up, it’s not in any sutras, The word here for 濟 / benefit also means “ferry,” which ties into the sutra Lin Jing quoted above.]

“Of those who can benefit mankind and subdue souls, there is none other…” These words seem to float halfway across Dragon City, from the elder Zhao … no, from Shennong-bo’s mouth. “Recently, I have been harbouring doubts.”

Zhao Yunlan sits lazily reclining by the window, crossing an ankle over one knee, looking outside. Dragon City University’s head office is within view; he has no idea if it’s because exams are near, but Shen Wei is surrounded by students asking him questions as soon as he’s finished class. Zhao Yunlan follows him with eyes carrying a hint of a smile, and spares very little attention he has left to ask, “Hmm, like what?”

“The divine wood plaque Shansheng left behind — why is it called the Zhenhun-Ling?”

[TN. Shennong-bo always uses the more polite form of ‘you’ when addressing Kunlun. 您/nin instead of 你/ni. He also refers to Kunlun as 山聖/Shansheng, which in this configuration means ‘sacred mountain,’ btw, this is not a real world title, no god is referred to by it, priest made it up afaik. From Shennong-bo’s mouth, it’s just another way to say ‘you.’ I’ll use the pinyin when it’s a name/title, and a translation when it’s a common noun.]

Zhao Yunlan sweeps over a glance. “What do you think?”

Shennong-bo stops to think, then carefully choosing his words, says, “I have heard that there are only two kinds of people who are unafraid of death. One who is carrying out the true wish of his heart, blames on one, has no regrets. The other, one who knows exactly what is on the other side of death. In these five thousand years, the Zhenhun Lamp continued to burn. All of this happening now: the shattering of the Lesser Wheel of Reincarnation, the creation of the Greater Wheel of Reincarnation using the Ghost King’s soul as a medium and borrowing Great Merit from the Zhenhun Lamp to join them together — is it all just a gambit by the Old Gods?”

The corner of Zhao Yunlan’s mouth rises, revealing a dimple on his cheek. “If we’re so clever, then how come we all died off one by one? Shennong asked you to keep an eye on Zhanhun-shi. Did five thousand years of watching him turn you into a conspiracy theorist?”

Shennong-bo just looks more and more suspicious. “Then why did Shansheng leave behind the Zhenhun Lamp and the Zhenhun-Ling? Why did my founding teacher just happen to let out your memories and powers at that exact, crucial moment?”

“When Shen Wei decided to wipe my memories, he’d already fulfilled everything he agreed to in his contract,” Zhao Yunlan pours himself a cup of tea, “The contract is concluded, and the influence Shennong had on both of us dissipated entirely, and that’s why I was able to ‘wake up.’”

Shennong-bo says, “Then you’re saying … it’s a coincidence?”

“That’s not it, either,” Zhao Yunlan murmurs after a little thinking.

Shennong-Bo is even more confused.

Zhao Yunlan looks at him, but not in the way a son looks up at his father. His gaze passes through their two mortal shells, falling onto the medicine pot itself.

At this moment, he seems to have become an elder.

“Wait some more,” he says. “Maybe give it another thousand, another two thousand years, you’ll get it. Some things must be learned through your own experience; it won’t do you any good for someone else to just tell you. When you want to sacrifice your life for a just cause, you’ll be able to grasp truths that no one else could understand. Whether it’s about the Zhenhun Lamp or Shennong’s contract, when we made those decisions at the time, we were only able to grasp a shadow of the future. It could move in a good direction, or maybe …”

Shennong-bo asks, “And if it didn’t move in a good direction?”

“The world will naturally gain new gods after we die. They’ll learn from our mistakes. It’s not in vain.” Zhao Yunlan hears Shen Wei’s familiar footsteps coming upstairs, and he gets up, takes the windbreaker he’s hung on the back of his chair and throws it over an arm. He turns his head to Shennong-bo, “Aren’t you one of the ‘new’ gods?”

Shen Wei arrives as Shennong-bo is still mulling over that, and with an indifferent air gives him a courteous, perfunctory nod. When his gaze lands on Zhao Yunlan, it softens in an instant. He asks, “Are you leaving now? Have you finished with your conversation?”

Zhao Yunlan makes a sound of agreement, and says to Shennong-bo, “Drive carefully on the way back, don’t let my dad notice anything. Take good care of his body.”

Shennong-bo stands, saying deferentially, “I must thank Shansheng for the guidance. In truth, I came today to beg my leave. It can be said that I have accomplished my task and it would be unseemly to hang onto a mortal’s body any longer.”

Zhao Yunlan seems taken aback, but only for a second. “When are you leaving?”

“Today,” Shennong-bo says, “I’ll return elder Zhao home right away.”

[TN. 趙先生 could be translated to Mr. Zhao, but Shennong-bo is old and formal, so I went with what 先生 would have been translated to according to Mencius. 先生，父兄也。And older man in a family, a father or an older brother.]

“That’s good.” Zhao Yunlan thinks for a second, and without a care, waves his goodbyes. “Take care. Don’t hesitate to come to me if you need anything.”

The couple leaves for downstairs together. Shennong-bo stands silently by the window, and watches the two of them move unhurriedly toward a residential neighbourhood across from campus full of European style houses with gardens, walking at an leisurely speed like they’re taking an afternoon walk. He’s reminded of what Zhao Yunlan said, that he’s been waiting for Shen Wei so they can move house together.

Farther ahead, from the neighbourhood greenbelt to the immense balconies of the buildings, clusters of flowers of every colour blossom soundlessly where they pass. Only now does Shennong-bo realises that spring is already in the air.

[TN. 春意 means both ‘the start of spring’ and ‘thoughts of love.’]

#zhen hun #鎮魂 #鎮魂番外二 #guardian #fox translates 鎮魂 #fox translates zhen hun #guo changcheng #the word count is that high bc i spent like 50 of them explaining 蛋疼 #lol sorry #ah feel free to come yell about what ZYL says at the end #because UGH

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foxghost · 6 years

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青, or the most confusing colour word in old Chinese ever.

This is because while there is a modern distinction between 綠 green and 藍 blue, in the past we had 青 / qing for 'nature’s colour’. In any old text (and old words still used) it could mean, depending on context:

blue

youthful / young

pale yellow.

green / verdant

the band of colour just above blue in the rainbow (紅橙黃綠青藍紫, which puts 青 in between green and blue）if you're a kid but when you get to form 1, you get that the rainbow is actually 紅橙黃綠藍靛紫, so the blue-green we thought was blue green is now blue.

The blue of blue white porcelain (青花瓷）

clear sky blue - 青天.

indigo blue (青出於藍而勝於藍 / qing comes out of the indigo plant and yet it is more vibrant than indigo)

black.

Also, 青衫 may read “green clothes,” but together and describing historical / mythical figures it just means “scholar’s robes,” where the word 青 means ‘young’ and the robes could be any colour. It describes the style, not the colour.

A line from Peach Blossom Debt: 青衫公子站起身，本仙君驚且喜，恍若東風拂過，三千桃樹，花開爛漫。 The young noble clad in scholar’s robes stands, and this immortal one is pleasantly surprised, as though the east wind chanced by and every brilliant flower on three thousand peach trees blossom.

So, a very important question --- what colour are Kunlun’s robes? Chapter 68:

大慶依稀想起那如遠山一般翠色的青衫，袍袖中帶著新雪與竹製的香(...) Daqing faintly remembers those scholar’s robes coloured like the bluish-green jade of distant mountains, sleeves carrying the fragrance of new snow and incense made with split bamboo(...)

So, 千峰翠色 / the bluish-green of a thousand mountain peaks, or the colour of 青瓷 / celadon pottery made in the Tang dynasty, not to be confused with blue-white porcelain even though it uses the same character, because that’s a line from some 唐詩 / Tang poetry. That’s anywhere from a brown cast to a very light jade green to a sky blue. (Historically. Modern celadon pottery is mostly light cyan or light green.)

I’m also depending on the words of a cat when he was a baby, so maybe he just means the colour of distant mountains from where he grew up and he’s not quoting poetry.

*squints at Kunlun mountain*

*shrugs* in the drama he wore blue but not a scholar’s robe?

Conclusion: the word 青 has always made me want to tear my hair out, and I’m going to go colourpicker a distant mountain if I’m ever going to draw anything.

#fox text #fox translates zhen hun #kunlun #fox translates 鎮魂 #one could start drawing or obsess over colours first #pick a colour any colour #i've seen him in blue or green all the way to indigo in fanart #what brought this on?#i keep seeing pictures in fanvid of him in a really searing green #and there was no light stable green dye in ancient china #also there's no distinction between scholar and student. good luck

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foxghost · 6 years

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Chapter 79 excerpt translation / ZYL is (canonically) a pervert

for long long hair, that is. Not really spoilerish if you already know the gist of the weilan first meeting, just fluff. for @surreality51

---

"The divine wood gave me a vision of what happened five thousand years ago." From where he's draped over his pillow, Zhao Yunlan turns to say, "I saw the first time you laid eyes on me and fell from a huge rock into the water. I thought that must be because I was so handsome and sparkling, in an instant you were blinded by the light, and it shocked you so thoroughly you fell right into a gutter ... ow!"

The hand Shen Wei happens to have already clasped over Zhao Yunlan's waist involuntarily tightens.

Zhao Yunlan says, "My, my old back ... are you trying to murder your dear husband?"

Shen Wei rubs gently over the complaint, and goes quiet for a while. It's probably because they've already been intimate, but he surprises Zhao Yunlan by calmly admitting, "Truly, the moment I saw you I felt as if all three and seven pieces of my soul scattered, and from then on you were unforgettable."

[TN. Soul: figure of speech]

Overly pleased with himself, Zhao Yunlan grins, and laughing an utterly vulgar laugh, he says, "Ai, Professor Shen. Take off your glasses. Change into your long hair and let your hubby see."

Obediently, Shen Wei takes off his glasses. He returns to his original appearance, and suddenly jet black hair seems to spread over the entire bed.

There probably comes a time when every stupid man has that indescribable fixation with long hair, but regardless, Zhao Yunlan feels as if he's hit in the bulls-eye, right in his weakness. He stares and stares at Shen Wei, and then reaching over a perverted hand, he strokes over Shen Wei's hair cautiously, solemnly. With his heart on his sleeve he murmurs, "Great, great great great beauty. I think my entire life is worth this moment."

[TN. ZYL uses the word 灑家 as his personal pronoun instead of "I" like he's a dandy from the Song/Yuan dynasty or something. Also, what he said at the end is equivalent to: I could die right now and die happy.]

#guardian #zhen hun #fox translates 鎮魂 #fox translates zhen hun #zhao yunlan #shen wei #weilan #also all of ZYL's dialogue is embarrassing and hard to translate because i'd never use those words omg

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foxghost · 6 years

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after changing it 10 times over 10 videos, I've finally decided on my translation for that line.

鄧林之陰初見崑崙君，驚鴻一瞥，亂我心曲。

In forest’s shade I first see Kunlun-jun, a mere glimpse of a graceful silhouette, made discordant my heart's melody.

/mostly because i don’t have room to explain mythical forests and it looks nice on a screen

#fox text #fox translates 鎮魂 #fox translates zhen hun #it is v late #i should be sleeping #also i'm actually not sure if they meant the mythical forest but i mean they're ancients so of course they were #but not text-wrapping? a requirement #night

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foxghost · 5 years

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Things 趙心慈 says

Just some lines that keep coming up in vids that I’m putting here for c&p purposes.

堪不破長久， Can't endure through permanence 看不透是非， Can't understand right and wrong 分不清善惡， Can't differentiate between good and evil 辯不明生死。 Can't tell apart life and death

人心存污， Men’s hearts harbour corruption, 常憂思而多苦， often suffer from worry, 固怒而生怨， hold grudges from anger, 盡可為不可為之事， commit countless crimes they ought not. 唯不作惡三字， Only the three words ‘do no harm’ 乃天下大善， is the greatest virtue under heaven, 可濟世鎮魂者， and of those who can benefit mankind and subdue souls, 無他耳。 there is none other.

#zhao xinci #趙心慈 #fox translates zhen hun #let's not even get into 無他耳 #chinese #guardian

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foxghost · 4 years

Video

youtube

[EN Sub]【鎮魂 Guardian】【巍瀾】盤古創世，沈巍成神（原著向(電影）

[Guardian] [Weilan] Pangu creates the world, Shen Wei attains godhood (novelverse fanmade movie) by 珮玉衡兮琳瑯 from bilibili

The whole novel in 42 minutes.

(link to translated fanvid playlist now @ 19.5 hours)

#guardian #鎮魂 #fanvid #fan MOVIE omg #fox translates things #subbed this one just a couple of days ago #I have a collection of novel!verse vids subbed #i really should make a rec list #queued #zhen hun

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foxghost · 5 years

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Translation notes for the Guardian Fan-song 一令長安 / A Writ of Lasting Peace, novel excerpts included as well as credit at the end, do take a look at that — like a lot of great fan productions, it was made by an army of fans. Link to song profile on music163 (leave comments here) Link to song profile on 5sing (has fanart) Art FMV on bilibili Drama FMV on bilibili

For the novel lines, I made notes, but for the lyrics, I’m putting down my initial ‘meaning’ draft and the full sentences I constructed from them.

一令長安——鎮魂同人曲（劇情版） A Writ of Lasting Peace - Guardian original fansong (plot version)

Youtube post with subbed video

沈巍：“有一個人，我和他萍水相逢，什麼關係也沒有，在他心裡，我只是個說過兩句話的陌生人。可我還是想再多看他一眼。” Shen Wei: There is someone … him and I met by chance like patches of drifting duckweed. There is no relationship between us at all. In his heart I am but a stranger he’s spoken to once or twice. And yet I … still want another glimpse of him, once more. [萍水相逢 means to meet by chance, but I chose the literal translation because it’s prettier, and still perfectly understandable.]

趙雲瀾：“你從沒開口和我要過任何東西，弄得我連討好都沒地方討，其實你真的想要什麼，大可以直接告訴我，只要我有的……騙我幹什麼？” Zhao Yunlan: You’ve never opened your mouth to ask me for anything. It’s left me with no avenue to even get on your good side. Really though if there is anything that you want, you can just tell me outright. As long as it’s something I have … What’s the point of lying to me? [The second sentence reads: You’ve made it so even if I want to win your favour, I have no place to do so. Just a shorter rephrasing.]

大刃落崑崙，混沌初隙 Great blade falling upon Kunlun mountain, The first sign of chaos through a fissure [When a great blade falls upon Kunlun mountain, the first sign of chaos shows through the wound] 濁土化山魂，臨風睥睨 Muddy earth creating a mountain soul, Looking disdainfully in the direction of the wind [From the mud comes a mountain spirit who looks disdainfully into the wind] 昧火拜往生，長焚戾氣 The samadhi true flame gives life, In its long burning, great malignance was born [The Samadhi true flame gives a gift of life, birthing a great malignance in its scorching heat] 九幽承此諾，翻覆潮汐 Beneath nine layers of the underworld, a vow was borne, Turning the tides [Caught in the nine layers of the underworld he bears this oath, turning the tides]

【輪迴晷】繼輪迴，慼慼生殺替 [Reincarnation Dial] To turn the wheel of reincarnation, Sorrow in a cycle of birth and murder [To turn the wheel of reincarnation / Sorrowful is a cycle of birth and murder] 【山河錐】安山河，業業十八獄 [Mountain River Awl] To calm the mountains and rivers, Towering, Eighteen levels of hell [To calm the mountains and rivers / Towering is all eighteen levels of hell] 【功德筆】辨功過，灼灼血字筆 [Merit Brush] To sort merit from sin, A shining brush that writes in blood [To sort merit from sin / Shining is the brush that writes in blood] 【鎮魂燈】鎮心魂，錚錚千秋意 [Guardian Lamp] To subdue heart’s soul, Intention unwavering through a thousand years [To subdue heart’s soul / Unwavering the intention unchanged through a thousand autumns] [I went from the meaning translation back to the literal translation here, because “thousand autumns” means the same thing as “thousand years.”]

汪徵：“三界六合，總有你不知道的人和不知道的事，也許你確實很有本事，可是托生成人，就算有天大的本事，能大得過天地，大得過命嗎?人不能活得太傲慢，要是狂得連諸天神佛都不放在眼裡，也許有一天會遭報應的。” Wang Zheng: In the three planes of existence, the four cardinal directions, heaven and earth, there will always be people and matters that you know nothing of. Maybe you really are quite capable, but once you have been reborn into a mortal, then no matter how capable you are, could you be greater than the heavens and earth? Greater than fate itself? A person must not live too arrogantly. If you’re mad enough to deem the gods and Buddhas unimportant in your eyes, perhaps one day retribution will come to you. [I spelled out exactly what 三界六合 means: “Three worlds” is easy, and “Six directions that come together” is like a 3d axis: four cardinal directions as well as up and down.]

【汪徵】未解懵懂意，朝露已晞 [Wang Zheng] Before these confused desires were understood, The morning dew has already dried in the sun [Our concealed feelings has not been made known,but the morning dew has already dried in the sun] 【祝紅】誰寄無心處，溫存誤許 [Zhu Hong] Who has sent towards a heartless place, An error in affections promised [One who seeks love in a place of heartlessness has misplaced her affections] 【楚恕之】我本輕狂客，何關天律 [Chu Shuzhi] I am a frivolous visitor, What do I care of heaven’s laws [I have always been an irreverent guest, why would I concern myself with heaven’s laws?] 【郭長城】福祿祭燈魂，無聲無息 [Guo Changcheng] Fortune made sacrifice as a lamp’s soul, Without sound and fury [Without sound or fury, I have made a sacrifice of my fortune for the soul of a lamp]

祝紅：“趙處，你給我一句話，只要你給我一句話，我從此可以和族人斷絕一切關係，刀山火海也跟你到底！” Zhu Hong: Zhao-chu! You just give the word. If only if you’d give the word, Then from this moment on I would break off all of my connections to my tribe, I would follow you to the end into a mountain of swords and a sea of flames. [刀山火海 / A mountain of swords and sea of flames, is an idiom for “extreme danger,” translated as is.]

郭長城：“就，就是不做壞事，偶爾遇到能幫上忙的，就搭把手，我什麼都不會的。” Guo Changcheng: I … just don’t do bad things, and occasionally, if there’s something I can help with then I help out. I…I don’t know how to do anything.

楚恕之：“我不是別人，趙雲瀾你記著，我戴上功德枷是我自己樂意，是給他們臉，不是低三下四的承認我的錯。” Chu Shuzhi: I’m not ‘other people.’ Remember this, Zhao Yunlan. I wear the merit cangue because I chose to do so. I’m giving them face. It does not mean I’m bowing and scraping to admit I was wrong.

趙雲瀾：“我富有天下名山大川，想起來也沒什麼稀奇的，不過就是一堆爛石頭野河水，渾身上下，大概也就只有這幾分真心能上秤賣上兩斤，你要？拿去。” Zhao Yunlan: I am rich with famed mountains and endless rivers under heaven, but none of it feels rare when I stop to think about it. It’s all just a pile of broken stones and uncultivated streams. From head to toe, probably only this bit of true heart is worth anything weighed on a scale. You want it? Take it.

沈巍:“我連魂魄都是黑的，唯獨心尖上一點乾乾淨淨地放著你，血還是紅的，用它護著你，我願意。” Shen Wei: Even my soul is black. There is only a spot of cleanliness in the apex of my heart, where I keep you. My blood is red, still. If I can protect you with it, I’m perfectly willing. [Rephrased “With it protecting you, I’m willing”]

心魔本無物，當年青衣 The demon of the heart is but an illusion, In the black clothes I used to wear [The demon of the heart is but an illusion, like the black robes I was clad in all those years ago] [TN: I’m actually not sure about the 青衣 since it can be both ‘servant’s clothes’ and ‘black clothes’ but I went with the art vid depiction of him in black. The first one I would usually spell out as “seven emotions and the six desires” but it’s no more clear than “demons of the heart” so, translated as is.] 敢觀不敢憶，三拜菩提 I dare to behold but not to recall, Three bows towards understanding [Would I dare to behold but not to recall, those three bows toward understanding] [TN. Three bows toward Bodhi, but considering it’s from Shen Wei, I chose a less religious word for ‘enlightenment’] 刀斬黃泉路，難拒折戟 A blade to part a road to the underworld, A disastrous defeat that cannot be resisted [As I cut my way through the underworld, a disastrous defeat seems imminent] 后土獨相赴，枉盡舊旅 Attending to the great seal alone, Vainly keeping a promise to walk a familiar road [In vain I keep a promise to make this familiar trip, attending to the earth’s great seal alone]

曾至虔，奈何未相惜 Once I acted with reverence, And yet I did not cherish you [Though once I venerated you, it is regrettable that I failed to cherish you] [TN. ambiguous for either the relationship between lao-Li and Daqing, or Shen Wei and Kunlun. Worded to fit both.] 問歸期，我輩本不羈 If asked of our return, We have always been unruly [When asked of our return, we answer, “Have we not always been unruly?”] [TN. again ambiguous — either for Zhao Yunlan asking for Shen Wei to return in the later part of the novel when ZYL refused to take his ‘medicine,’ or for Mianmian not returning beneath the seal where he belongs.] 一令安，長明鎮故里 A single command for peace, A long lasting light that calms my native home [A writ of peace, like a shining brightness that calm the place I used to call home] 笑白駒，與君共天地 We laugh at the way time flies, With my lord we share the heaven and the earth [We laugh as the white horse of time pass us by, and with my lord we share in heaven and earth] [TN. 白駒 here is short for 白駒過隙, which means “how fast time flies.” I added words to keep the metaphor and the meaning behind the idiom.]

趙雲瀾：“我別的東西也有，只是你可能大多都看不上，只有這一點真心…你要是不接著，那就算了吧。” Zhao Yunlan: I have other things, but you probably would not look favourably upon most of them. Only this bit of true heart… If you won’t catch it, then forget it.

沈巍：“我接住了，你這一輩子，生生死死、死死生生我都再不會鬆手，哪怕你有一天煩了、厭了、想走了，我也絕對不會放開你，就算勒，也要把你勒死在我懷裡。” Shen Wei: I’ve caught it. The rest of your life, in life and in death, no matter what happens to us, I will never again loosen my grip. Even if one day you grow tired of me, loathe me, and you want to leave, I will still absolutely not let you go. Even if I must bind you, I would rather have you strangled, have you breathe your last in my embrace. [TN. SW here literally says “if we live or die, we die or we live” and I changed one of them to “no matter what happens to us.” The word 勒 / strangle is used twice here, and I translated the first one to ‘bind’ because it can also mean to ‘rein in’ as in a horse. ‘Breathe your last’ is an addition, to make it clear what Shen Wei means.]

Production staff： Producer：燦鴆 Singer：妖揚 Song writer / Arrangement：水墨流蘇R Lyrics：微我無酒 Designer：Carol嬋 Artist：江湖夜雨 Pv（Art Version）：蕭翼fair Pv（Cut from drama version）：連城琬 Calligraphy：零雨其濛濛 Late stage：沢渡溫 Special thanks：怪獸黍鶴 Voice cast： Shen Wei：趙羞澀【星之聲】 Zhao Yunlan：嚴楓 Zhu Hong：贇珩【翼之聲】 Wang Zheng：一隻檀檀子【SN工作室】 Chu Shuzhi：浩然【KA.U中文配音社】 Guo Changcheng：南楓【羽落有聲】

#guardian #weilan #guardian fansong #fox translates zhen hun #鎮魂 #巍瀾

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